Damn It Azamir: The Movie
by Susumu-Chan
Summary: A more comedic spin on the standard plot of Miitopia, starring an all new cast! When the mysterious Dark Lord Azamir begins stealing the faces of the people of Miitopia, it's up to a girl named Susumu and all her friends to stop him!
1. Scene 1: Enter The Dark Lord

Our story begins a long time ago, and yet not so long ago at all, in a land known as Miitopia. This land was a carefree place, where Miis could live their lives without worry. Yes, it certainly is peaceful here... That is... Until an ominous shadow fell across the land. A strange force stole the faces of Miis all across the land, and to make matter worse, stuck them to all kinds of monsters as well!

Now, the people of Miitopia were certainly in a predicament, weren't they? A life without a face is no way to live, after all. However, all was not lost for this humble little land! As fate would have it, a girl by the name of Susumu happened to be passing by...

"Ahh... It's another peaceful day..." Susumu yawned. Susumu was kind of a spacey girl, a little bit sleepy and fragile, and something of a magnet for danger. Nevertheless, she had a good heart, and soon enough she would discover her destiny.

As Susumu was walking, however, she noticed something very strange floating through the sky. "Huh?" She squinted to see what it was. "That looks like... A pair of eyes?!"

And as the floating object drew closer to Susumu, she was surprised to see that she was right! A pair of eyes was drifting down from the sky! She sat there wondering what it could all mean, when suddenly, something smacked her right in the face, and really hard at that!

"Owww!" Susumu recoiled in a mixture of pain and shock at what she saw right in front of her. The eyes had stuck themselves to a nearby Rock Moth, and now it was trying to attack her! That first hit... Hurt a lot more than she expected. She already felt like she was going to cry, and she didn't think she could take another hit like that.

"W-when in doubt... Run for you life!" she exclaimed. And that's exactly what she did. She ran, and ran as fast and as far as her legs could carry her... Until they could carry her no more. When Susumu look back up, she found herself at the entrance to a small town. "A- A town...? Oh no... I-I have to go warn someone!" She ducked into the town as fast as she could.

Just inside the town gates, Susumu was greeted by... Someone who seemed to be a cat? And a bright blue, nervous looking one at that. "H-hey you," he said to her. "Gosh, you... Look really pale. And- and out of breath. You feeling okay?"

"...M-Monsters!" Susumu started panicking. "Here! Outside of the town! Someone's gotta do something!"

"M-Monsters?" The cat shook his head. "Oh, no, you must be mistaken. There's no monsters here in Greenhorne. ...H-hey, uh... Why don't you look around town a little? You look like you could use a break."

"Well... Maybe if I do SOMEONE will listen to me..." Susumu mumbled.

"You say something?"

"O-oh, nothing. Just... Maybe you're right. I think I will have a look around, thanks."

As Susumu walked down the main street of Greenhorne, she saw... Quite a selection of interesting people. A cheerful looking bear lady was standing by her window. A blonde lady was trying to keep her sparkly-eyed son under control. A kind of shady-looking guy with messy hair was looking at her from the sidewalk. Near the other end of the town was another cat, a yellow-colored one who was... Rather oddly dressed, and he seemed to be waving to her.

"Oh, someone who can help me!" Susumu was relieved. "Please, I need help! There's monsters just outside the town! L-look, I got hurt pretty bad, and..."

"Hey, just calm down, would ya?" The cat tried to calm her down. "I'm Thunder Star. And, uh, this is Greenhorne. It's a pretty safe place, so you're free to rest here if you-"

He was interrupted, however, when a shadow suddenly fell across the town. "Ahahaha..." A strange shadowy figure appeared in the sky above the town. As far as Susumu could tell, he had an odd, catlike smile, and closed eyes that seemed to slant upward. "Ahem. Attention, people of Greenhorne. I am the Dark Lord, but you may call me Azamir. Well now, isn't this lovely? Such a quaint little town... It certainly would be a shame if it were to be... Oh, consumed by darkness, wouldn't it?"

"Wait, what?!" Susumu began to panic. "Who- What-"

Azamir opened his eyes, and with that, the faces began to disappear from the townspeople. From the shady guy, the bear lady, the sparkly-eyed child, and even the blue cat from before.

Azamir's smile seemed to grow even more as he shut his eyes again. "Yes, yes, this will do nicely," he said mostly to himself, before looking back at the town. "Oh, but this is only the beginning. For those of you left behind... You'd best watch your step, because I just might return for you next. Farewell for now, Greenhorne, and enjoy a life drowned in despair! Ahahaha..." And just as suddenly as he appeared, Azamir vanished.

"...What in Garaden's..."

"Traveler! Traveler, please!" The blonde woman frantically made her way up to Susumu, carrying her son with her. "M-my name is Crown. That awful Dark Lord... He- He took my little Jabari's face!" Crown then held up her son, showing that his face was indeed missing. "Please, you have to do something!"

"B-But what can I do?" Susumu asked. "I nearly got my tail handed to me out there, and, I'm no fighter..."

Crown stopped to think for a moment. "Well... I may have something here that can help you," she answered. She then produced some sort of amulet from her apron, handing it to Susumu. "This is an old amulet that's been in my family for generations, but... I have a feeling that you could make better use of it than I can."

Susumu nodded, and placed the amulet in her bag. "Thanks, Miss Crown," she said. "I can get you your son's face back, don't worry!" With that, she headed out the town's gate, setting off to search for any missing faces.

"...At least, I hope I can..."


	2. Scene 2: The Call Of Garaden

No sooner had Susumu left Greenhorne than she started to hear an oddly familiar voice. "Ahahaha..."

She jumped at the sudden noise. "A-Azamir?!"

Sure enough, the Dark Lord himself appeared before Susumu's very eyes. "Well, well. Someone's trying to play the hero, is she?" Azamir said, in a mocking tone.

Susumu couldn't lie to herself, she was... Beyond terrifed. Her heart was pounding like there was a drum in her chest, and her legs were shaking so that she could barely stand. Her voice hung in her throat for a second, but she was finally able to get her words out: "...G-Give Jabari his face back! Now!"

Azamir, however, just seemed amused by her terror. "Ahahaha. You're trying so hard, aren't you? Trying so hard to hide how weak you really are... But I can see the truth in your eyes- You're absolutely terrified, aren't you? And just look at the state you're in. Another hit like that and it'll all be over for you, won't it? Ah, you're in luck, however. I have just the thing to finish you as quickly as possible."

Azamir opened his eyes, and some sort of blob-like creature appeared in front of Susumu. He didn't stop there, however. Out of nowhere, he produced... Jabari's face?! The girl could only watch in fear as Azamir stuck the child's face to the blob.

"Ahaha. You're both so cute together," Azamir taunted the girl. "It's too bad, I would've liked to play with you a bit longer... Oh well, one less little pest in my way, I suppose. Ahaha..." And with that, Azamir vanished once more.

"Okay, okay... Just don't panic..." Susumu tried to calm herself down, but it wasn't working at all. "I-I can always just-"

She didn't have time to run away, however, before the slime reared up to attack her. "Waaah!"

And yet, at the same time, the amulet Crown had given her was beginning to resonate with her body. Surprisingly enough, all the pain in her body suddenly faded away. She began to open her eyes, only to wish she hadn't, as she was greeted with a VERY bright light. A voice came from the light. "Susumu... Susumu? Can you hear me? It's me... Garaden..."

"G-Garaden…?" Garaden? The goddess of the world? What was she doing here, and why was she talking to Susumu? "D-does this mean I…" Her eyes began to fill with tears. Was… Was she… Dead…?

"Oh, no! I assure you, you're still perfectly alive!" Garaden tried to explain herself. "You remember that amulet Crown gave you? Well… It allows me to speak to you. And from the looks of things, you're in need of some assistance."

Susumu nodded. "Yes, please! I need all the help I can get right now!"

"Very well then, my dear!" Garaden replied. "You may feel a bit dizzy for a moment, but I think I know just what I can do for you! Haaa... ...HAAAAAA!"

The next thing Susumu knew, she was suddenly dressed in... Some sort of mage's robe! She even had a hat and a wand, and it was even a bright blue color too! "Eh?! Can... Can I really have all this, Garaden?"

"Of course you can, child!" Garaden assured her. "Now go forth, and rescue Jabari's face!" The light faded, and Susumu found herself back in the real world.

"Did... Did that really happen...?" Susumu took a quick look at herself. Sure enough, she was still wearing the robe Garaden had given her, and she felt a lot better as well. "Okay... It's time to see what I can do now!" She charged at the slime with Jabari's face, swinging her wand as she did so.

She managed to do a decent amount of damage, but the slime quickly retaliated by striking at her. And yet, this hit seemed to hurt a lot less than the last one. Was it just her, or were these new clothes making her stronger too? Sure enough, it only took her another hit to take down the slime.

"I-I did it! Now how do I..." Susumu was about to do something to get Jabari's face back, but before she could, it just seemed to... Fly right off of the slime. "Oh! I have to get that face back!"

"Wait just a moment, Susumu!" Garaden stopped her. "It seems like Jabari's face is going back to Greenhorne. Perhaps you should go back there and check on him. But, before you do, Susumu... I have something to ask of you. Well... You have seen the acts of Dark Lord Azamir. And if he isn't stopped, well... Things are going to become a real mess around here. And so, I, Garaden, humbly ask you, brave Susumu... Will you take on the quest to defeat the Dark Lord?"

Susumu couldn't believe this. Garaden was asking her of all people to take on something like this? "W-Well... I-" She almost said no. She almost refused and went home. But... She had also seen what happened to the townspeople. She couldn't just do nothing, could she? "...Garaden, I accept! I-I'm not the strongest of people, but... I'll do it!"

"Excellent, my dear!" Garaden seemed pleased. "Go forth, and save the world's faces from the Dark Lord!" As Garaden's voice faded away, Susumu made her way back into Greenhorne.

Crown, meanwhile, was cradling her son in her arms. "Oh, traveler!" She called out to Susumu. "You... You saved my little Jabari! Are you okay? You didn't get hurt, did you?"

Jabari seemed unhappy about this. "Aww, it was more fun being a monster..."

"I'm just happy I could help," Susumu replied. She still didn't feel like a hero, and yet... She was glad that Crown could be happy again. Her face then turned serious. "But, other people still need their faces back. I've decided that I'm going after Azamir!" She tried to do a heroic pose for effect.

Crown looked slightly worried. "Oh dear. All by yourself? Well... If you can save my little Jabari, then I'm sure you can save everyone else. Good luck, dear!" Crown and Susumu waved to each other as Susumu set out once more.

And thus begins the quest to defeat the Dark Lord Azamir and save the faces of the world! It will be very difficult, but Susumu was confident that she could do it! She'd make new friends, fight enemies, and-

Suddenly, a realization snapped her out of her internal monologue.


	3. Scene 3: New Faces

Susumu quickly found herself surrounded by Rock Moths. "W-where did they all come from?!" She was frightened, and knew she couldn't beat them all herself. "I-I can't fight like this..." She huddled up on the ground, hiding inside her robes in the hopes the Moths would go away, until...

FWISH.

When Susumu looked back up, all the Rock Moths were gone. She put her head back down, however, when she saw someone approach her. "Uh, are you gonna get up now or what?" A voice asked her. "Why were you hiding from those things anyway?"

Susumu tilted her head up slightly to get a look at whoever was standing in front of her. The stranger was a somewhat tall boy, dressed in leather gear, with a very stern look on his face. "Uhhh..." Susumu wasn't sure what to say now. She was still somewhat embarrassed to admit how weak she was...

The boy sighed. "Well, whatever. Name's Yardi. What are you doing out here on your own anyway?"

"Susumu!" Susumu exclaimed as she stood up. "Uh, that's my name. Susumu. And I'm on an important mission from Garaden to defeat the Dark Lord Azamir!"

"Garaden? Dark Lord Azamir?" Yardi sniffed. "Geez, how hard did you hit your head on the way down here? Even if there was a Dark Lord, why would Garaden pick someone like you to stop him?"

"Well... I honestly don't know myself," Susumu admitted. "But! I can't hang around here all day!" She darted off. "I've gotta go find Aqua's face!"

"Hey! Wait!" Yardi called, chasing after her. "Geez, you're gonna get yourself killed if you go it alone! I'm coming with you!"

"W-wait, you're what?!" Susumu was shocked by this. "But, why do you wanna help me?! We only just met, and you don't seem like the helping type..."

"Hey, I just saved you from getting eaten by moths, alright? Besides, this world's gonna chew you up if you don't get someone to help you!"

Susumu seemed confused by this, but she decided not to argue. "Right... Anyway, we've gotta find Aqua's face. I'm willing to bet that it'll be stuck to a monster somewhere."

Sure enough, after a minute of searching, the two came across a particularly large butterfly. They didn't really think anything of it, until it turned around and they saw...

"Look!" Yardi exclaimed. "That thing's got a face on it!"

"And it's Aqua's face no less!" Susumu pulled out her wand, prepared to fight.

Yardi, however, already had his knife in hand, slashing at the butterfly. "What, more stupid butterflies?" He snorted. "This should be over in no time!"

The butterfly, however, ended up hitting Yardi pretty hard in return. "Yardi! A-are you alright?!"

Fortunately, Yardi seemed to be a lot tougher than Susumu. "It's... It's nothing!" He assured her, slashing at the butterfly. "Go on, hit that thing with all you've got!"

Susumu nodded, and pointed her wand straight at the butterfly. "Okay... I'm going to try something..." She thrusted her wand forward. "FIRE!"

The butterfly was suddenly engulfed in flames, and that was enough to take it down. The butterfly was defeated, and. as before, Aqua's face flew off of it and back into town. "We did it!" Susumu exclaimed, dancing around a bit.

"Hey! We're not outta the woods yet!" Yardi scolded her. "Don't we have to get like three more faces back?"

"Hmph... Could've just let me victory dance..."

And so the two continued along their way, searching for the rest of the townspeople's stolen faces. As they were walking, however, Susumu heard that familiar voice once more. "Ahaha..." She wasn't even surprised this time when Azamir's figure appeared before her. "Well, well, if it isn't the little hero herself," he remarked. "My, my, you certainly do get places, don't you?"

His words only served to make her angry. "Hey, Azamir! I've got a bunch of new powers now, and I'm gonna take you down here and now!"

"Ahaha. How precious," Azamir mocked. "She thinks she can defeat me just because she has shiny new clothes. Well, let's see just how tough you really are..." Azamir opened his eyes, and a pool of shadows began to form around Susumu's feet.

"Ee!" Susumu tried to get out of the way, but... She couldn't move her body at all. Some strange force was holding her in place, and a feeling of dread was starting to consume her. Was she going to be dragged into darkness, or something far worse, or...

"Stop!"

Suddenly, there was a flash of bright green light. A small yellow creature streaked by, the shadows around Susumu's feet disappeared, and she found herself able to move again.

An annoyed expression crossed Azamir's face. "Oh, it's you again," he huffed. "Must you always ruin my fun?"

The small creature placed a tiny paw on her chin, and spoke in a high, squeaky voice. "So, you're this Dark Lord I've heard so much about? You look... Familiar somehow. No matter. I will not allow you to bring harm to the innocent, no matter who you are!"

Azamir frowned at her. "Hmm. What a shame, I could have used another soul for my collection..." He then pointed directly at Susumu. "Don't think I'm finished with you yet. The next time we meet, I will not hold myself back any longer. Farewell." With that, Azamir vanished once more.

The small creature turned back to Susumu, who was now shaking on the ground. "Do not be afraid, child," she said. "My name is Martcha. You must be Susumu, correct?"

Susumu looked up, nodding. "H-How did you...?"

"Well..." Martcha began. "This is going to be hard to explain, but I... I'm something of a god, as it were. That Dark Lord... He's been tormenting you for a while, has he?"

"Y-Yeah... But, don't worry!" Susumu jumped up. "I'm going to stop him! ...But..."

Martcha nodded as Susumu spoke. "But... You feel like you aren't strong enough to take him on, is that right? Listen to me, Susumu. You may not think you're much now, but you have a great future ahead of you. If you continue saving the faces of the world, you're only going to keep getting stronger. Then, one day... One day you will be able to defeat the Dark Lord. Do you understand? Just hold on, and keep helping people. I must go now, but I have a feeling that we will meet again." Martcha turned away, and flew off into the sky.

Susumu wasn't exactly sure what just happened, but... "If Martcha is who she says she is... Gosh, she was cool either way. And... She believes in me too." Susumu stood up, dusting herself off. "Yardi! Martcha! I'm going to get stronger for both of you! Hear my words!"

"...Who are you yelling at?" Susumu was interrupted by Yardi, who had finally caught up to her. "Where did you even go anyway? We've gotta go save the rest of the town!"

"Oh yeah, that's right." Susumu mumbled. "Come on, let's go see where Caden's face could be."


	4. Scene 4: Twins!

As Susumu and Yardi were on the path to recover the last two faces, they could swear that they heard someone's voice in the distance.

"OHGARADENTHISWASAMISKTAKEWHYWHYWHYWHY-"

"Hey, Yardi?" Susumu seemed confused. "Did... Did you hear something?"

"It's probably one of the faces that got stolen!" Yardi answered. "We should go find it before-"

At that moment, however, a person dressed in blue ran out of nowhere, ramming right into Susumu. "Owww!"

"Hey! Watch where you're going!" Yardi scolded the charging person, before reaching down to help Susumu up. "You alright, Susumu?"

"Urghh... Y-Yeah, I'm okay... My head hurts, but... Who's Susumu?"

Yardi couldn't believe what he was seeing. This person... He wasn't Susumu? But... He looked just like her! "What in Garaden's-?!"

"Augh, m-my head..." Susumu sat up slowly, but quickly jumped up when she saw the person Yardi was helping. "Wha- Hey! You look just like me! But... Who are you?"

"Oh, I'm Sachio! And, you must be Susumu, right?" He looked at Susumu for a minute. "Gosh, you're even a mage, just like me! Oh my Garaden, are we twins?! I've always wanted a twin!"

"Hey, me too!" Susumu exclaimed. "Oh my Garaden, we really ARE twins! Hey, Yardi, can we take him with us? Maybe he can be useful!"

"Actually, it'd be great if you could help me," Sachio replied. "I was just kinda walking along, minding my own business, when suddenly, a rock with a face started attacking me! I tried to fight it, but... I couldn't do it alone!"

"A rock with a face?!" Yardi demanded. "Take us to it! That face could belong to one of the people of Greenhorne!"

It didn't take long for Sachio to lead the others to the face-rock he was talking about. "Hey! That looks like Caden's face!" Susumu commented, taking out her wand. "We've gotta get it back!"

Yardi was already swinging his knife, but... "Huh?! This- This one's tougher than that butterfly!" Well, yeah. It WAS a rock after all. The group attacked the rock with everything they had, but they could only do a little bit of damage at a time.

The rock quickly struck back, by... Rolling into the entire party. "Oww! It can hit all of us at once?!" Susumu exclaimed. "That isn't fair!" She launched another burst of fire at the rock, and Sachio did the same shortly after.

The rock rolled up to attack once more. "Oh no, you don't!" Yardi took a defensive stance, bracing himself for impact. The hit hurt him a little less, but... Susumu and Sachio still took the worst of it.

"Urgh..." Susumu slumped onto the ground. "I gotta hold off a bit..."

"Yeah, me too..." Sachio added.

"Hey! You two better-" Yardi tried to scold them again, but they had already both fallen asleep. "Augh, do I have to do everything myself?" Fortunately, the rock was almost destroyed, and Yardi was able to finish it off himself.

Caden's face flew off and headed back towards town. "Right, now there's only one more face to-" Susumu and Sachio, however, were still fast asleep. "Hey! WAKE UP!"

It took a while for Yardi to shake the two awake, but eventually they lifted their heads. "...Oh. Mornin', Yardi." Susumu yawned. "What's going on?"

"You two just conked out in the middle of a fight, that's what!" Yardi screeched.

"Well, it's alright," Sachio replied. "We just have to get Caden his face back and-" It wasn't until then that he realized that Yardi had already saved Caden's face.

"Can we just move on?" Yardi asked. "We've still gotta get Catbear her face back!"

"Oh yeah," Susumu and Sachio stood up. "Catbear's face is still missing. I wonder where Azamir took it..."

"It can't be far from here, can it?" Sachio remarked. "Come on, we have to keep going."

And so the group continued on their journey, and before long they found themselves in a strange cave...


	5. Scene 5: Catbear, Vinny, and Prince Saff

"Heyyy, look at this place! It's some kind of demon cave or something!" Sachio was completely taken as soon asthe group entered the cave.

"Aw, cool!" Susumu bounded inside after him. Yardi, however, trudged along behind the two.

"Would you two slow down?" Yardi snapped. "We don't even know what's IN this place! Besides, it smells really moldy in here!"

"I, uh... I don't think that's mold, Yardi," Susumu commented. "Whatever that smell is, it's... Hurting my nose a little."

"Yeah, it smells more like... Something's burning," Sachio added.

As the group got further into the cave, the burning smell only seemed to get stronger. "Gah... Nothing's right." Out of the darkness stepped some sort of small figure. As the figure approached, it seemed to be... A dog? Dressed in a chef's outfit, talking and walking on two legs, no less?!

Yardi stared at the dog in confusion, not even noticing when he spoke. "...Hey," the dog said. "You, uh... You alright there? ...Well, anyway... Name's Vinny. As you can tell, I'm a chef."

"Chef?!" Yardi was stunned. "But- You're a dog!"

"Yeah, I'm... Not so good at cooking," Vinny stated. "I've been looking for some new ingredients, trying to see if I could learn a few things. But... With this Dark Lord guy around, I've just kinda been hiding in here."

"Hey, we're going after the Dark Lord ourselves!" Sachio exclaimed.

Vinny looked at Sachio in silence for a moment, before closing his eyes. "...Okay. I'll go with you," He suddenly said.

"Wait, what?! We never said-"

"No, no, you don't need to," Vinny stopped him. "Besides, if I go with you, I'll get to travel the world, won't I? Anyway, come on. I think I saw that Dark Lord guy over by Greenhorne Castle."

"Uh... Okay, I guess he's coming with us," Yardi stated. The rest of the walk through the cave was rather uneventful, and soon the group found themselves atop some sort of stone wall.

"Is this Greenhorne Castle? Where do you think Catbear's face might be?" Susumu asked.

"If you remember what she looks like, it shouldn't be too hard," Vinny remarked. "I guess we just keep going until we find it."

Before long, however, they began to hear yet another unfamiliar voice. "The creature attempted to attack, but I simply scoffed in its face. 'Ha! You think that you can defeat me? I, the highly honorable Prince Saff, shall strike you down in an instant!'"

The voice belonged to what seemed to be... Someone with VERY bright yellow hair, and his outfit didn't make him any easier to look at. Right in front of him, seemed to be some sort of imp, with...

"Hey, you!" Yardi charged in. "You get away from there! We need to get that face back!"

"What in Garaden's-?!" Yardi pounced on Saff, trying to get him away from the creature. As he did, however, his friends had alreayd initiated a fight with the imp. By the time Yardi was through with Saff, the rest of the group had already saved Catbear's face. "Great, you see what you did?!" Yardi snapped. "Who are you even-"

"Ahem." Saff completely ignored him. "The battle was hard-fought, but fortunately for the dear girl, my expert swordplay was enough to save her life. I humbly accepted her gratitude with grace and dignity."

Susumu didn't know what to say. "...Is this guy for real?"

Yardi, however, had plenty of words for Saff. "Who... Who the HECK do you think you are?!"

"AHEM. If you MUST know, I am the highly honorable Prince Saff!" Saff declared. "I have decided to grace this humble land with my presence, ever since I heard that a GORGEOUS princess arrived in Greenhorne Castle!"

"I wouldn't say 'grace' is the word for it..." Vinny joked.

"Well, whatever!" Saff huffed. "After the princess hears the tale of how I so daringly rescued you, she'll be head over heels for me! Now get out of my way! my darling is waiting for me!" With that, Saff pushed past Susumu and Sachio and dashed off toward the castle. "I shall not keep you waiting any longer, my sweet!"

Yardi was seething. "That... That LOWLIFE!" He charged off after Saff. "I'M NOT FINISHED WITH YOU!"

"Yardi, wait!" Susumu called after him. "Guys, we've gotta go get him!" Susumu and the others took off after Yardi, and soon they made their way to Greenhorne Castle.


	6. Scene 6: Big City Princess

"Well, here we are, everyone," Sachio said. "Greenehorne Castle. But where are Yardi and Saff?"

"We'll probably find them inside," Vinny remarked, walking into the castle's gate.

Susumu took a look around once she got inside the castle. "Gosh..." She breathed. "I've never even SEEN a castle before, let alone go inside one. But... It's going to be hard to find Yardi, isn't it?"

However, it wasn't long before they heard a particularly loud voice coming from one of the rooms. "I think that answers our question," Vinny commented.

"ANDTHERE'STHISGUYNAMEDSAFFANDHE'SPROBABLYGONNASTEALYOURDAUGHTERAND-"

"Yardi!" Yardi stopped his rant when he heard Susumu calling out to him. "Are you in there? We've been looking for- SWEET GARADEN ABOVE WHO IS THAT?!"

"Hey, Susumu! I heard you screaming and- AAUUUGHH!"

When Vinny entered the room, however, he wasn't as shocked as the others. "Well... Looks like we've found the king."

Wait, THIS is the king? Susumu was a bit shocked at that. He was... Well, HUGE, to say the least, and yet... His face was... Tiny?! "A-are you... King Keith?"

"Why yes, I am," the king responded. "And you... Must be friends of this strange boy here? He came in talking about someone coming to steal my daughter... But... I don't even HAVE a daughter, is the thing."

"Wait, you don't?" Sachio was confused. "But... We heard there was a princess here, and..."

"Oh! You must mean Louie," Keith explained. "Honestly, I don't know what his deal is. He just sort of... Showed up one day and told everyone to call him a princess. I... Actually don't have the heart to tell him off, so he just kind of stayed here."

"Well... We'll just have to go tell him to be careful!" Yardi stated. "There's this guy named Saff who's coming here to get him, and what's more, he's gonna brag about how HE saved Susumu! HIM, of all people! Who does that-"

"Yardi's point is, Saff is lying," Vinny continued. "Susumu didn't need saving. She was with us the whole time. Watch out for that Saff guy, okay? He doesn't seem like a very good person at all."

"Is that so?" Keith remarked. "If what you say is really true, then... You'd better go tell Louie, right? He's staying in the next room. This Saff... He sounds like some kind of lowlife."

"Yeah, that's what I said!" Yardi exclaimed. "Come on, let's go warn the princess!"

"Yardi, wait!" Sachio tried to stop him. "We shouldn't just-"

Too late. "PRINCESS LOUIE!" Yardi charged into Louie's room, without even bothering to knock.

"WHAT IN GARADEN'S-!"

There was a loud commotion for a few seconds, and once the group got into Louie's room, he had... Already beaten up Yardi. "Urf... This... Louie guy's stronger than he looks..."

At that moment, Louie turned around to face the group. "What in Garaden's name is- Oh." He suddenly calmed down at the sight of the group. "Who the heck are you?"

"Princess Louie, my name is Susumu," Susumu explained. "And these are my friends. That's also my friend that you're, uh, stepping on there. He was... Trying to warn you about something."

"Oh. Uh... Sorry 'bout that then." Louie reached down to help Yardi up. "Anyway, uh... This Sus'mu girl... She says ya came to warn me 'bout somethin'?"

"Her name is 'Susumu', not 'Sus'mu'," Yardi groaned. "And yes, we did. There's this guy named Saff, and he's on his way here for you right now! We don't know what he wants, but... He was calling you sweet and all that!"

"Isn't that what I said? Sus'mu?" Louie shrugged. "Anyway... What's this Saff guy goin' on 'bout? There's only one guy I care 'bout that much. Name's Todd. ...Come to think of it, I haven't seen him in a while. Knowin' him, he's probably gotten himself into some kinda trouble. Say, ya know, you look like a buncha strong travelers. Ya think ya could, ya know, go after Todd for me?"

"Well, we could, but..." Sachio remarked. "You're... Really strong. Like, seriously. Can't you just go out and find him yourself?"

"Oh, uh... No, I can't, actually," Louie admitted. "I would if I could but... It's not in the script."

"The... What now?" Susumu was confused.

"Nevermind. Anyway, uh... If ya find Todd, could ya bring him back here for me?" Louie asked. "He's probably somewhere around the village, so he shouldn't be too hard to find."

"Well, everyone... I guess we don't have a choice," Susumu sighed. With that, the group set out to go find... Louie's friend, as it were.


	7. Scene 7: Meanwhile In Michigan

As the group went searching for Todd just outside of Greenhorne, it actually didn't take very long to find him. On one hand, he was just on the edge of town! ...On the minus side, he has gotten himself trapped by a group of goblins.

"Ahem. ...Excuse me, but... Would you all mind getting out of my way?" Todd asked, extremely politely. The goblins, however, didn't seen to be listening. "I said, would you all mind getting out of my way? ...No, no. This isn't working. There must be something else..."

As Todd paused for thought, however, the group caught up to Todd. "Look!" Sachio pointed to him. "There he is! And... Hey, is he trapped?"

Yardi had already taken his knife, ready to charge into battle. "If he's in trouble, we've gotta save him!"

Susumu and Sachio quickly took their place together, but Vinny took his time in preparing to fight. Yardi was starting to get annoyed by this. "Come on, hurry it up!"

"...Okay. Let's do this." Finally, Vinny had arrived, and the battle could begin. Yardi, of course, was the first to attack, hitting all of the goblins with a single slash of his knife.

Susumu launched a fireball at the goblins, but Sachio had something else in mind. "Alright, you guys, watch this one!" He twirled his wand around a bit before pointing it to the sky. A lightning bolt came down from the sky, hitting all three of the goblins at once.

It was then time for Vinny to make his move. He yawned slightly, and seemed to be doing something with his frying pan. "What are you-" Susumu was about to ask, until she saw that his frying pan suddenly turned red hot. He ran up and swung the pan at one of the goblins, taking it down with no trouble at all.

With two goblins left, Yardi swung his knife again, doing a decent amount of damage. One of the goblins rushed to attack Vinny, until... To everyone's surprise, Vinny held up his frying pan in front of his face, blocking the hit completely. Susumu launched another fireball at the group, taking down another goblin.

"Yardi! Let's finish this together!" Susumu exclaimed.

Yardi was a bit surprised by this. Susumu... Wanted his help? "O-Okay!" He answered. The two attacked the last goblin together, finishing it off.

"Hey! Todd!" Susumu called to Todd. "Are you okay? You're not hurt, are you?"

"...No. I'm not hurt," Todd responded. "And yes, I am Todd. As you can tell, I strongly dislike fighting. Talking things out is much easier anyway. I came here looking for Louis, but... I can't seem to find him anywhere."

"Hey, you mean Louie?" Sachio asked. "He's waiting for you in Greenhorne Castle! He's... Gotten himself into an interesting situation though."

"Is that so? I see," Todd replied. "Thank you for helping me, and for finding Louis. He... He tends to get himself into trouble often. I suppose we'd better go to him..."

And so the group made their way back to Greenhorne Castle. When they arrived, however...


	8. Scene 8: Tower Terror

"...And so, I, the highly honorable Prince Saff, rescued the poor helpless girl from the terrible monster!"

Louie, however, seemed less than impressed with Saff's words. "...Yeah. Well, thanks for comin' out," he huffed. "Ya can go now. I don't need to hear anymore." He then began shoving Saff out the door.

"Wait, Princess Louise!" Saff tried to stop him. "Aren't you impressed by my daring rescue of sweet Susan? Don't you want to hear more of my exploits?"

"Not really," Louie replied flatly. "Now, I told you to-"

"Louis!" Todd and the others suddenly appeared in the doorway.

"What the-?!" Saff pulled away from Louie and stared Todd right in the face. "And who in Garaden's name is THIS?!"

Todd seemed unperturbed by Saff's glare. "...My name is Todd," he answered very calmly. "And I would appreciate you not putting your hands on Louis like that."

Saff grew angry at this. "Keep my hands off-" he demanded. "And who are YOU to tell ME, the Princess's BOYFRIEND, to keep my hands off of her?!"

"BOYFRIEND?!" That word alone seemed to anger Louie.

Todd, however, simply blinked. "I happen to know that Louis is NOT your boyfriend," he retorted. "He's only here because he-"

"He's the love of my life, that's why!" Saff snapped. "And I'm certainly not going to let YOU-"

"SHUDDUP!"

"Eek!" Saff jumped at Louie's sudden shout, and began cowering as soon as Louie approached him.

"FIRST of all, I ain't your boyfriend!" Louie snapped. "SECOND of all, I don't even want ANYTHING to do with ya, and THIRD of all..."

As Louie was telling Saff off, however, a strange shadow began to appear behind him. "L-Louis!" Todd tried to warn him. "There's- There's something behind you!"

Louie turned to Todd, and his voice got much calmer. "We can talk in a second, Todd, I gotta deal with this guy first." He turned back to Saff. "THIRD of all, that JUST so happens to be my-"

As Louie was giving Saff the verbal beating of his life, something started to happen. His face... Suddenly disappeared. "L-Louis! You're..."

"Ahahahaha..."

"Hey! Did you hear that?!" Yardi looked around. "That sounded like..."

"AZAMIR!" The group ran back outside, followed by Todd.

"Azamir? Who on Earth is that?" Todd asked.

"Azamir is this Dark Lord who's been stealing everyone's faces!" Sachio explained. "See that over there? He's headed to that tower over there! That must be where he's taking Louie's face!"

"I see. In that case... We'll just have to go save Louis's face ourselves, won't we?" With that, he began to make his way towards the tower.

"...We're going to have to go after him," Vinny commented. "He's not gonna last long in there himself." He then headed to the tower, with the rest of the group following along.

"Well, this is it," Susumu stated when the group finally reached the tower. "Where do you think Todd is?"

"He's probably gotten himself eaten by now," Yardi muttered.

"He's just inside the tower, Yardi," Vinny said. "Come on. Louie's face is at the top."

Susumu and Sachio, however, hesitated before entering. Yeah, they did want to save Louie's face, but... This place looked pretty scary. Not to mention, Azamir was in there. What if he took their faces, or-

"Hey, you two!" Yardi suddenly snapped them back to reality. "We're not just gonna leave you out here!" The two quickly followed the others into the tower.

The tower was even scarier on the inside than on the outside. "I-Is it just me... or is it really hard to breathe in here?" Susumu gasped.

"Yeah, she's right," Sachio was panting. "I can't breathe in here either..."

"You two are thinking too much," Yardi scolded them. "The sooner we get to the top, the sooner we can get out of here."

The climb to the top of the tower was slow and uneventful, and yet still completely terrifying. Once they reached the top, they found that Todd was already there, faced with some sort of armored creature. "Look!" Susumu pointed. "That's Louie's face, and Todd is here too!"

"...Ahem. Excuse me. But... Would you mind giving me Louis's face back?" Todd asked. The group couldn't believe it. He was... STILL trying to talk to the monsters?! The creature didn't listen, however. It seemed to be too enamored with Louie's face. "I said... Would you mind giving me-"

"Todd, get back!" Yardi suddenly interrupted, slashing at the creature with his knife. "That thing's not gonna listen to reason. We'll have to fight it out!"

Susumu and Sachio attacked the creature with fireballs, but they didn't seem to do much damage. "Guys, hang on!" Susumu warned. "This this is stronger than anything we've faced yet!"

The creature then attacked Yardi, slamming him right in the face. "Y-Yardi!" Susumu quickly rushed over to check on him. "Are you okay?"

"Urf... I-I'm okay!" He assured her. "But... You were worried about me?"

"Hang on." Vinny was preparing something. "...Okay. Here, eat this." He had... Cooked something out of nothing, some how, and was now offering it to Yardi.

"D-Don't need it!" Yardi stood back up and started swinging his knife again. Vinny simply shrugged and offered the food to Sachio and Susumu, who happily accepted.

The battle seemed to drag on for quite some time, until... "We've got it on the ropes!" Yardi commented. "Everyone, give it all you've got!"

Then Susumu got an idea. "Yardi, let me help! Sachio, Vinny, just follow me!" The four all banded together for an all-out attack, finishing off the creature and saving Louie's face.

As Louie's face flew back to the castle, Todd approached the group. "...Thank you. For saving both me and Louie's face, I mean," he thanked them.

"Yeah, yeah," Sachio groaned. "Now can we get out of here? Before-"

"Finally... I made it to the top of the tower." A familiar voice came from the doorway, and Saff was standing there. "It was a perilous journey, but I was prepared... To..." He then caught sight of the group. "! YOU! What are YOU all doing here?!"

"We just saved the Princess's face, that's what!" Yardi yelled. "Which is more than YOU'VE ever done for anyone!"

"Geh! Y-You... You saved...?!" Saff was stunned, but then began to throw a tantrum. "No, no no NO! I'M supposed to save the Princess! I'M SUPPOSED TO BE THE ONE WHO WINS!"

Yardi was tempted to sock him right in the mouth, but he was stopped by Susumu. "Come on, guys," she said. "Let's go back to the castle."

And so the group returned to Greenhorne Castle, leaving Saff in a pool of his own salty tears.


	9. Scene 9: The Road To Neksdor

"Louis!" As soon as the group got back to the castle, they went straight to Louie's room.

"Todd!" Sure enough, Louie's face had returned to where it belonged. "You... Ya got my face back for me, did ya?"

"It wasn't just me, Louis." Todd nodded to the rest of the group. "I... Had some help. And I think we got rid of Saff too."

"Let's hope so," Yardi huffed.

"Hey, you guys," Louie looked up at the group. "...Thanks. For savin' my face. And for bringin' Todd back to me. Tonight, we're gonna have a celebration, in honor of our heroes!"

"That sounds great!" Susumu and Sachio exclaimed in unison, before they saw the look Yardi was giving them.

"Excuse me, but shouldn't we go after the Dark Lord FIRST?"

"Oh yeah. About him," Louie stated. "I saw that guy fly off toward the desert. He must be headin' to Neksdor. That's where Saff is from."

Yardi's eyes widened as soon as he heard that, but Susumu quickly tried to calm him down. "Well, let's just hope we don't run into him again, okay? Thanks for telling us, Louie. Come on guys, let's get going to the desert."

As the group made their way through the Arid Frontier, however, Susumu and Sachio started to look more and more nervous. "What's up, you two?" Vinny asked them.

"We're going into the desert..." Susumu seemed a bit afraid to admit it. "I... I don't do so well with heat, and from the look of things, Sachio doesn't either."

"...Well, nothing we can do about it, hey? Hopefully Azamir won't cause too much damage there," was all Vinny had to says. Susumu, however, wasn't so sure.

The rest of the trip was uneventful, and by the time they stopped at the next inn, the desert was in sight. During the night, however, a strange shadow began to creep across the inn. "Ahahaha..."

Yardi was suddenly jolted awake as soon as he felt something grab him. "Waugh! H-Hey! Let me go! Susumu! Help me!"

But all Yardi's screaming didn't seem to wake Susumu at all. In fact, it seemed as though she was now shaking in her sleep. "No! Get away from me! Someone, help!"

Azamir shifted his glance to Yardi. "Oh, I don't think little miss hero can help you now," he said with a pout. "In fact, if I've done this right, she won't even remember a thing in the morning! Ahahaha!" With that, he scooped up Sachio and Vinny before vanishing into the night.

The next morning, Susumu woke up feeling... Pretty bad. "Urgh... W-why do I feel like..." She tried to sit up in her bed. "Yardi, wake uuuuup. I think I'm siiiiick."

But Yardi never answered. "...Yardi?" She pulled herself out of bed, only to find that Yardi was no longer there. "Sachio? Vinny?" Looking in Sachio and Vinny's rooms, they weren't in their beds either. "Where is everyone?!"

And that was when Susumu heard a familiar voice. "Susumu! Susumu, are you okay?! Azamir attacked you in the middle of the night, and he took all your friends with him!"

"Wait, he did what?!" Susumu demanded. "H-How am I supposed to go stop him now? I'm just a girl!"

"...Oh, yes. Now I remember," Garaden explained. "Azamir tried to erase your memory too. It seems he's made you forget about your powers... But you still remember everything else, so I suppose it didn't work!"

"I... I had powers?" Susumu was only getting more and more confused. "But, now what am I gonna do? I still have to stop Azamir, and now my friends are in trouble..."

"Fear not, young Susumu!" Garaden assured her. "I am still on your side, and I shall grant you a new set of powers with which to defeat Azamir!"

"Wait, you can do that?"

"Of course I can! I'm a goddess, remember? Now, just hold still, okay? Haaaaa... HAAAAA!"

When the light cleared, Susumu took another look at herself. She was wearing a long blue coat with a checked pattern on it, and on her head seemed to be a pair of plastic goggles! What's more, she was now carrying... A ketchup bottle? "Now go forth, Scientist Susumu! Rescue your friends, and knock Azamir down a few pegs while you're at it!"

"Whoa! Thanks, Garaden! So, what can I do? ...Garaden?" But before Susumu had a chance to ask, Garaden was gone again. "Guess I'll just have to figure things out myself..." She headed out the door and into the desert, not feeling particularly happy about it.

End Of Act 1


	10. Act 2, Scene 1: Prince Saff And The Lamp

"Urgh..." Susumu had only been traveling through the desert for a few minutes, and already she was starting to feel exhausted. As she walked, however, she came across a familiar figure.

"Now where did I drop... Oh no! I can't remember where I lost that lamp!" Martcha was hovering just above the ground, scanning the sand for something. Her eyes lit up, however, when she caught sight of Susumu. "Oh! Hello, Susumu!" she greeted. "I see you've gotten a new outfit. It suits you! ...Oh, are you feeling alright?"

Susumu put on a brave face in front of Martcha. "I-I'll be fine!" she replied. "Just... A little tired, that's all! Anyway, what's wrong? Did you lose something?"

"As a matter of fact, I did," Martcha answered. "I've lost... Something very dangerous, in fact. Oh, but allow me to explain. Many years ago, there was a genie by the name of Jeremy. He... Caused a lot of problems for the people of Neksdor, and they called me to help them. Of course, I was able to seal him away again, but... Now I've lost the lamp I sealed him in! ...If the wrong person were to get their hands on it..."

That last part set up a red flag in Susumu's mind. "H-hey, Martcha? Why don't I help you look for the lamp?" she offered. "Trust me, there's... Someone here that we do NOT want to find it."

"Oh, you would do that for me? Thank you!" Martcha seemed pleased. "If we split up, it may be easier to find it."

"Sounds like a plan, Martcha. Let's do it!" While Susumu stayed behind to search here, Martcha flew off towards the town. "...I just hope I can find it before Saff does..."

Meanwhile, however, Saff was walking through the desert alone, still moping over what had happened. "Princess Louie... Why would you reject me like that? Why... WHY would you choose... That PEASANT over me, the highly honorable Prince Saff? My brothers will all laugh and call me names now!"

As Saff was walking, however, he heard a voice. "Heh, having some girl trouble, are you?"

"W-who said that?!" Saff looked around, but all he could see was a lamp laying in the sand. He picked it up and looked at it more closely. "Was it you?!"

"Gah ha! You bet your fuzzy ears I did!" The voice said again. "And I can help you. With my power, I can give you whatever you wish! But you'll have to help me first. All you have to do is let me out of here."

"Anything I want, huh?" Saff paused for a moment. "With this, I could get Princess Louie to like me! I-I'll do it!" And so Saff began to rub the lamp.

Before long, a strange blue mist started to fill the area, and Jeremy appeared from the lamp. "Gah haha! Geez, how long's it been?! Look out, Neksdor, cause Jeremy's gonna rock you!"

"Heh, yeah," Saff said nervously. "Now, about what you said before. I want Princess Louie to like me!"

Jeremy just stared at Saff for a few seconds, before bursting into laughter again. "Gah hahahaha! What, you actually believed that?! I lied, you idiot! Later, kiddo!" And with that, Jeremy flew off toward the town.

"I... He just... What..." Saff stood there in silence, until Susumu approached him. "Y-you?! What are you doing here?!"

"A better question would be, what are YOU doing with that lamp, Saff?!" Susumu demanded. "Give it back, now!"

Part of Saff didn't want to give the lamp to Susumu of all people, but part of him also didn't want to admit he had just been tricked. Eventually, however, his pride won out, and he became angry again. "Fine! I didn't even WANT the stupid thing anyway!" He threw the lamp on the ground and stormed off.

Susumu picked up the lamp, brushing it off before putting it on her bag and heading towards the town. "Gotta find Martcha now... I just hope Saff didn't do anything..."

Susumu was feeling even more hot and exhausted by the time she got into the town. She was immediately greeted by a dark-haired girl with glasses, dancing near the town's gate. "Ra ra ra~! Hello there~! Welcome to Neksdor Town~! Oh dear, is something wrong? Don't look so pale, dear! Come on! Let's all sing and dance together! Ra ra ra ra~!"

"T-thanks, but..." Susumu didn't have the energy to sing or dance, so she just kept walking. As she was walking through the town, however, she was approached by a shady-looking man with bright red hair. "Eheh, excuse me, Miss," the man said. "but you're looking... Particularly ill."

"...Eh?" Susumu brushed her hair out of her face. It was true that the heat was getting to her, but... "And what are you gonna do about it?"

"Luckily for you, Miss, I happen to be a merchant myself," the man proudly proclaimed. "And I think I have a solution." He reached behind him, producing a bottle filled with some sort of red liquid. "This potion can cure anyone of any ailment! ...But, of course I can't just give it to you. The price is 1000 gold!"

"Wha- Thousand?! I don't have that much!"

The man paused to think for a minute. "...I'll tell you what. You seem like a nice enough girl, and you are in need. 800 gold! But that's as low as I'll go. I need to eat too, you know!"

"...Alright," Susumu took some gold out of her bag and handed it to the shady man. "I hope this is worth it..."

The man's eyes lit up as he handed over the potion. "Oh, trust me, Miss, it certainly will be! Pleasure doing business with you!"

Susumu put the potion in her bag and continued walking. Before long, she came across someone in a cat costume talking to a bear woman. The woman seemed... Upset. "Oh, it was just terrible! That awful Jeremy, he came right down and scooped up all my treasure! But... I thought the Great Sage sealed him away many years ago! Who could have released him?"

"Um, excuse me," Susumu spoke up. "My name is Susumu, and I'm on a mission to defeat the Dark Lord Azamir. And, I think I know who might have released Jeremy."

"Hey, you're out to defeat the Dark Lord?" The person in the cat suit asked. "Me too! My name's Neal. I guess this makes us allies, doesn't it?"

"Yeah..." Susumu smiled. "Yeah, it does! But..." Susumu pulled the lamp out of her bag. "Jeremy was released by this guy named Saff. But, don't worry! I'm a friend of Martcha's. And, with her help, we can seal him away again!"

"Portia, do you know where Jeremy went?" Neal asked.

"Well, I don't know exactly where he went..." Portia began. "But, I saw him fly away to the east! He's still gotta be there now, right?"

"Well, you heard the girl, Susumu!" Neal gave his tail a shake in preparation to take off. "There's a really big cave in the east too. Let's go see if Jeremy is there!"

Neal darted off at top speed, but Susumu trudged along behind him. Geez, it was hot here...


	11. Act 2, Scene 2: Azamir Attacks Neksdor

Susumu and Neal walked through the desert for what felt like hours. "Neal... Can we stop yet? How long have we been out here?"

"It's only been a few minutes, Susumu," Neal informed her. "Just hang in there, okay? It'll be a lot cooler inside the cave."

it wasn't long, however, before Susumu saw a tiny, yet very familiar, figure in the distance. "...Martcha!"

As soon as Martcha heard her name called, she made her way over. "Oh, hello, Susumu!" she greeted. "Have you had any luck finding that lamp?"

"Yes, we have!" Susumu answered, producing the lamp from her bag. "But... We think Saff might have released Jeremy. That guy... I don't know what his deal is."

"Is that so?" Martcha stopped to think for a moment. "Well... As long as you have the lamp with you... You can still seal Jeremy away yourself! You do know the trick to it, don't you?"

"...Uhhh..." Susumu had to admit, she didn't know the trick at all.

"It's really quite simple," Martcha explained. "All you have to do is keep saying Jeremy's name, over and over. With that, you should be able to seal him away easily!"

"Thanks, Martcha!" Neal thanked her. "I think I can see the cave over there, anyway."

"Well, we better get going..." Neal had already darted off towards the cave, however, by the time Susumu got moving. "Really, he has so much energy..."

Before Susumu reached the cave, however, she stopped for a minute. "Just... Hang on..." She remembered the potion she had in her bag, and pulled it out. "I hope this works..." She quickly drank the entire bottle.

But she didn't feel any better. In fact, after a few seconds, she... Started to feel worse. "Urk..." Her stomach started to feel like it was on fire, and before long she had collapsed onto the sand.

"Hey! Susumu! You gotta get up!" Neal tried to shake her awake, but she wasn't moving. "Susumu? Susumu!"

"Um... Excuse me... Are you okay?" When Susumu woke up, she found that the entire left side of her face was caked with sand. More than that, however, she heard an unfamiliar voice talking to her.

"Urgh... What... What did I just drink?!"

"Hey, just calm down!" Neal said. "I don't know what happened, but I called my friend Samuel here to heal you. Oh yeah, Samuel, this is Susumu!"

"It's nice to meet you," Samuel said with a slight smile.

"Nice to meet you too, but..." Susumu stood up. "Where ARE we?"

"We're in the Neksdor Cave," Neal explained. "This is where Jeremy is! I think he's further in though. Come on, let's get going!"

Susumu expected the search to take longer than it did, but the group could hear him gloating from a mile away. "Gah ha ha! Man, it feels great to be back! Where should I hit up next?! Actually, I've always wanted to see what's in that Greenhorne Castle. Gah hahahaha! Ol' King Keith better be ready for the Jere-man!"

"Too bad we're gonna seal you up before you have a chance to!" Neal declared, as Susumu produced the lamp from her bag.

"Gah! H-How long were you standing there?!" Jeremy demanded. "And... Where did you get that lamp?! ...Well, so what if you have it! If you don't know the magic charm, I'm here to stay! Gah hahahaha!"

"Ahem." Susumu stepped forward, holding the lamp in front of her... Until she remembered something.

Wait. What was his name again?

"...Jeremiah!" Susumu tried the first name that came to her mind, but nothing happened. "...Jason! Jerome! ...Jeffery?"

"...GAH HAHAHAHAHAHA!" Jeremy only burst out laughing at Susumu's attempts. "Stop- Stop it, kid! I'm gonna die laughin'! Gah hahahaha!"

Jeremy's mocking only seemed to make Susumu angry. "...Jeremy!" His name came back to her out of seemingly nowhere.

"Gah... Ha... ...WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?!"

"Jeremy!" Susumu repeated. "Jeremy! Jeremy!"

"U-Uh-oh! This ain't good!" Jeremy felt himself starting to be sucked back into the lamp, but he tried to escape. "H-Hey! Wait a minute! I-I'm sorry I laughed at you, okay? Can't we just talk about this?"

"Jeremy!" Susumu repeated once more.

"Augh! Please don't put me back in there!" Jeremy begged. "I'll give Portia all her stuff back, I promise!"

"...Fine." Susumu was still feeling angry, but she simply threw the lamp on the ground. "I won't seal you away. But you better give Portia all her treasure back!"

"...Eh?" Jeremy seemed a bit confused by this. "You're... Just going to let me go if I do? ...Well..." Jeremy was silent for a minute, but after a moment he picked up all the treasure he had taken and disappeared.

"We'd better go see if he kept his word," Samuel remarked, and with that the group made their way back to the town.

When the group got back into town, however, the first thing they noticed was that everyone seemed to have moved toward the center of town. In the middle of the commotion seemed to be the shady man from before. "I'm telling you, I saw it! There was some big shadow flying around over the desert, and it was coming this way!"

"Do you REALLY expect us to believe that?" Portia asked. "Vee, you've been cheating us all out of our money since day one!"

"A few weeks ago you sold me a can opener," A sleepy-looking man remarked. "Really, what the heck is a can opener for anyway?"

Vee looked around nervously, until he caught sight of Susumu. "Oh! Miss!" He waved her over. "I helped you earlier! You believe me, don't you?"

Susumu, however, remembered all too well what he had sold her. "! I- You- Potion-!"

"Is this the guy who poisoned you, Susumu?!" Neal demanded, removing his claws. Before Vee even had a chance to respond, Neal jumped up and delivered a flurry of punches to Vee's face, knocking him down with the finishing hit.

As the group was about to return to their homes, however, a strange darkness fell over the town. "Ahahahaha..." The townspeople stood staring in confusion, until their faces began to disappear. The dancing girl, the sleepy-looking man, Portia, and even Jeremy's face were taken away, before the shadow flew off.

Vee sat up, rubbing his swollen cheek. "T-there! Now do you all believe me?! It won't be long before he comes back for the REST of our faces too!"

"M-Milo... He was telling the truth!" A white-haired woman started sobbing. "Someone has to do something!"

"But... That shadow... It went towards the pyramid... None of us could stand a chance in there!"

Neal then turned to the rest of the group. "Aha! That sounds like Azamir!" he stated.

"A pyramid, huh?" Susumu started smiling. "Now THAT could be exciting! You guys up for a treasure hunt?" She then took off toward the pyramid, with Samuel and Neal following close behind.


	12. Act 2, Scene 3: Priffs and Pyramids

The group got to talking a bit as they made their way to the pyramids. "So, Susumu," Neal asked. "Do you live around here? In the desert, I mean?"

"Wha- Oh no, I couldn't," Susumu answered. "I can't stand heat. Or cold. Or heights. Or..."

Susumu was interrupted when something suddenly jumped out at her. "Augh!" Neal had to keep her from falling backwards onto the sand. "W-what is that?!" Picking herself up off the ground, she got a good look at what had attacked her: Some sort of cobra with a face stuck to it.

"Susumu, be careful!" Neal warned, swinging his claws at the cobra. "That thing has Milo's face! We've gotta get it back!"

Susumu nodded, and stepped back a bit. "Alright, time to see what my new powers can do!" She was a bit startled by this, but suddenly some sort of screen popped up in front of her face. Without even having to think about it, she knew exactly what to do, and began typing furiously. As she did, the cobra seemed to flicker slightly, somehow causing it damage.

Samuel, however, stood back slightly, not fighting very much at all. He did spring into action, however, when the cobra reared up to attack, hitting Neal pretty hard. "Neal, look out!" he warned, raising his staff to the sky. Before long, Neal's injuries were completely healed.

Susumu looked back, catching a glimpse of how worried Samuel looked. "Thanks, Samuel!" she exclaimed, swinging her ketchup bottle at the cobra. "You may not think it, but you're doing a lot for us!"

"Really?" Samuel started smiling at Susumu's words. He knew he was better at healing than fighting, and he was always worried about helping people because of that... But he was doing good, right? Suddenly, he felt a rush of energy. "Susumu! This is for you!" He charged up and swung his staff at the cobra, taking it down easily.

"That was great, Samuel!" Neal praised him. "But... Is this the pyramid? Do you think Azamir is in there?"

As Susumu looked at the pyramid, she could've sworn she heard a voice in her head. "Kukukuku... I see you've come to fight the Dark Lord."

"Huh?" Susumu looked around, trying to find the source of the voice. "Did... You guys hear something?"

"Hear what?" Samuel looked around, confused.

"It's probably just the heat getting to you, Susumu," Neal pointed out. Come on, you can cool off once we're inside." He then darted into the pyramid, with Susumu and Samuel following.

"Y-yeah. Inside," Susumu agreed. Before following Samuel and Neal, however, she noticed something shiny on the ground. "...Some kind of jewel?" She picked it up and put it in her bag. This could be important later...

Once the three got inside the pyramid, they came to a split pathway. Neal stood back to assess the situation. "Well, which way do we go?"

Looking at the two paths, Susumu began to hear the voice again. "Kukuku. Take the left path. I'll handle things on the right. Don't be afraid, I'll guide you."

Susumu instinctively went down the left path. "I guess we're going left," Samuel remarked, as he and Neal followed Susumu.

The group came to another path, and the voice came back to Susumu. "Go right this time. Then left, left, right, left, right. Don't forget, okay? Right, left, left, right, left, right..."

"Right, left, left, right, left, right..." Susumu repeated, going down the right pathway. She then followed the rest of the voice's directions. As the group got closer, Susumu could swear she heard a very familiar song. "Ra ra ra ra..."

In the final room, the group came across... A floating painting? With Ariel's face on it, no less? "Ariel's face!" Susumu exclaimed, popping up the screen in front of her again.

After Susumu launched her attack, Neal wasted no time. "Just a second..." He began sharpening his claws on the stone floor.

"Neal! Susumu!" Samuel called out. "I want to help too!" He pointed his staff straight in front of him, and a beam of light came down from the sky and hit the painting.

Neal, meanwhile, had finished sharpening his claws. "Stand back, you two!" He jumped up into the air, letting loose a flurry of slashes on the painting, dealing a ton of damage.

After a few more hits, the painting was almost finished. At that moment, Susumu began to try something. "Let me see if this works!" She gave her ketchup bottle a good shake and pulled off the lid, spraying some sort of red liquid at the painting and finally taking it down.

As Ariel's face flew away, that strange laugh could be heard again. "Kukuku... I knew you all could handle it~"

"It's that voice! It's coming from..." Susumu was interrupted, however, when yet another face came flying down the hall, followed by... A person? A girl with short black hair wearing some sort of lacy purple outfit again. "You... You were..."

"Priff." The girl said. "My name is Priff. And yours is Susumu."

"Y-Yeah, it is!" Susumu exclaimed. "How did you..."

"Kukukuku... It's kind of hard to explain," Priff began. "But, I was inside your head. I... Can do that to people. I can change people's feelings and thoughts... Hey, don't give me that look. I can't control people or change them permanently or anything. And hey, I did help you, didn't I?"

"Uh..." Susumu was confused, but she simply shook her head. "What are you even doing in this pyramid anyway?"

"Same thing you are," Priff explained. "At least, I was. But... It's oddly calming in here, kukuku~"

Samuel then spoke up. "Um, if you're here to fight the Dark Lord, then... Does that mean you know where he is?"

"Sure do," Priff confirmed. "And I can take you there, too. ...Only thing is, we need to get a few items first. Well, I'm sure you can handle it, hey? Let's go."

"Uh... Okay. I guess we're working with Priff now," Susumu stated, following her down the next hall.


	13. Act 2, Scene 4: The Ancient King Of Miit

After what seemed like ages of walking, Priff led the others to some sort of door. "This is the only thing between us and Azamir," Priff explained. "The only thing is, I... Can't figure out how to open it."

Samuel stepped up, taking a closer look at the door. There seemed to be a diamond-shaped jewel set into it, with three more diamond-shaped holes around it. "Um... Do you think these diamonds have something to do with it?" he asked.

"Diamonds? ...Hey! I picked up a jewel like that outside!" Susumu remembered as she produced the jewel from her bag. She stepped up to the door and carefully placed the jewel into one of the slots.

"A perfect fit!" Neal declared. "But... We only have two diamonds now. Where are the others?"

"Kukuku. If I may~" Somehow, as Priff stepped up to the door, she seemed to be holding the two remaining jewels. "These were left behind after we defeated those paintings," she explained, placing the jewels in the slots. "I wonder... Did Azamir give them to his monsters to guard? ...Anyway..." Once she was finished, something started rumbling, and the door began to open. As it did, however...

"Ahahaha. I see the little hero has returned."

"AZAMIR!" The group called out, preparing to fight.

"I must say, I am rather surprised," Azamir remarked. "I thought I erased your memory... And yet here you are. You really are just begging to be punished. It almost makes me sad... Almost, I say."

Azamir then reached behind him, producing Jeremy's face. "I take it this is what you've come for, yes?" He asked, a bored expression crossing his face. "Really, you are getting a bit predictable. But I suppose that's good for me as well, isn't it?" Without elaborating on what he meant, he opened his eyes, and a bright light filled the room. "And so the game continues. Ahahaha..."

When the light faded, Azamir was nowhere to be seen, but... "Susumu! We've got trouble!" Neal exclaimed, motioning for her to turn around. When she did, she saw that Azamir had stuck Jeremy's face to an enormous golden mask.

"...We're gonna have to fight this thing, aren't we?" Susumu groaned.

"We are," Neal affirmed, sharpening his claws once again. "Everyone into position!"

Priff, meanwhile, stood with her eyes closed for a second. "Kukuku..." She reached behind her back, producing...

"A fork?" Samuel was confused. "You're going to fight with... A fork?"

"It's better than you think," Priff stated, before stabbing her fork at Jeremy.

The fight continued without much incident, and the group managed to deal a decent amount of damage. At that moment, however, Jeremy decided to try something. he stared directly into Susumu's eyes, he started to emit a strange golden glow.

"Eep!" Susumu had no idea what this meant, but she knew that she did NOT like being stared at. She closed her eyes, but not before they flashed the same golden color. When she finally did open her eyes, however, something was... Off about her. It was hard to tell, but her eyes were more golden than their usual yellow color, and her eyelashes seemed thicker than normal. When she spoke, her voice was oddly stiff and monotone: "I... Am... Pharaoh..."

"Susumu? What are you-" Neal thought this behavior alone was very strange, but... Susumu knelt down and put her ketchup bottle on the ground. Was she... Refusing to fight?! "Hey! Susumu! You gotta get up! We have to save Jeremy, remember?"

"Kukuku... She's been cursed," Priff informed him. "I checked. Her mind is a complete blank right now. She can't hear us. We'll have to keep going without her. If we can defeat Jeremy, she'll be freed."

The group continued fighting, minus a cursed Susumu, until Susumu stood up once again. "Hey! Susumu! Snap out of it!" Neal tried to call out to her once more.

She completely ignored him, however, and walked up to Jeremy, producing an HP Banana from her bag as she did so. "Please, accept this!" She declared, offering the banana to him.

What she didn't notice, however, was that Jeremy was preparing to attack her as she did so. "Susumu!" Samuel tried to warn her. "Look out! You're going to-"

But he was too late. The hit was strong enough to knock Susumu out, particularly in her currently disarmed state. "Susumu!" Neal tried to shake her awake. She was still alive, but there was no way she was getting back up from that one. "You!"

Priff and Samuel took position next to Neal. "Kukuku... Let's finish this in Susumu's place~"

Neal nodded, and reared up to attack. Samuel raised his staff to the sky, and Priff twirled her fork. The three of them launched one final all-out attack. Even without Susumu, they were strong enough to take out Jeremy.

Once Jeremy's face had flown away, Samuel returned to Susumu's side. "Come on, on your feet again!" He raised his staff into the air, casting his healing magic on Susumu.

"Ugh..." After a moment, Susumu stood back up. "...Oh, hey guys. Uh... Did we ever save Jeremy? I... Kinda spaced out for a bit there."

"You... Don't remember that?!" Neal demanded. "You just gave all your bananas to Jeremy's floating head!"

"...I did?" Susumu asked. "I... Don't remember doing anything like that."

"Kukuku. We freed you from the curse~" Priff stated. "Now, I'm sure you all want to get out of here as much as I do, so if you don't mind..." She then began heading for the exit.

"I thought she said this place was calming..." Samuel mumbled, as the group followed Priff out. Well, whatever. It had been a rough day, especially for Susumu, and they all just wanted to finally get some rest.


	14. Act 2, Scene 5: Rescue Mii

When the group got back to Neksdor, the town was... A lot more lively than when they first arrived. Ariel was dancing for a group of people, singing about how Susumu had saved her face. Vee was arguing over a can opener with Milo. He almost stopped to greet Susumu when he saw her walk by, but kept his mouth shut when he saw the look Neal gave him. His face was still bruised from before and he did NOT want a round 2. But more than anything, Susumu was stopped by Portia as she was about to leave.

"Oh! Susumu!" Portia called out. "I just wanted to thank you for saving my face! I thought I'd never get to see another sunset again..."

Jeremy, meanwhile, was looking forlorn. He looked like he had something to say. Portia gently nudged him until he finally spoke. "Susumu! T-thank you! Not just for saving my face, but... You made me realize... When I had my face stolen, I was terrifed. I thought I would never get it back. Is... Is that how I made Portia feel?"

"You're absolutely right it is!" Neal declared. "Taking other people's stuff is wrong!"

"Yeah, I can see that now!" Jeremy agreed. "I... I just... I'm sorry, alright? I... I don't think I wanna rob anyone anymore... From now on, I'll never steal another thing as long as I live! ...Well, maybe some small things every now and then... ...Gah haha! I'm kidding, I'm kidding!" He only added that last part after seeing the look Portia was giving him.

"Don't listen to him, Susumu," Portia sighed. "I'll be keeping an eye on him to make sure he doesn't cause any more trouble. As for you, you're probably gonna keep going after the Dark Lord, huh? If it helps any, I'm pretty sure I saw him heading off towards the east, to the Realm Of The Fey. Maybe you should check there next?"

"Thanks for the info, Portia," Susumu thanked her before heading out. "And good luck keeping a handle on Jeremy there."

Neal darted off towards the next inn, barely waiting for his friends to catch up. "Kukuku... is he always so hasty?" Priff asked, hovering along after him.

Samuel gave Susumu a looked of concern as the two continued through the desert. He suddenly... Remembered something about this place. "Susumu... Can I ask you something?" He began. "Um... What all have you eaten today?"

What... Had she eaten? That was a bit of an odd question, but... "Well..." Susumu stopped to think. "Just some Rock Candy... And a few Doggy Donuts, and some Butterfly Honey... And a glass of- AAAAUGH!"

Samuel covered his eyes at Susumu's scream, as she was suddenly grabbed by something. She had no idea what had happened, but the rest of the group knew all too well. "Susumu?!" Neal dashed over towards the scream, with Priff trailing just behind. "Susumu, what happened?!"

Samuel was shaking quite a bit, but he pointed straight ahead. "Su... Sususu..." He didn't even have to finish his sentence, however. Samuel was pointing to a Venus Mii Trap, which seemed to have something inside it.

Susumu could still be heard struggling from inside the Mii Trap. "Ugh! W-what's going on?! You let me go right now! I-I can't breathe!"

The Mii Trap didn't seem too willing to let Susumu go, however. Samuel was beside himself. He had no idea what he should do, and tears were streaming down his face. "Susumu... Is... Is Susumu gonna get digested alive?!"

"That isn't likely," Priff assured him. "Besides, we'll save her long before she gets swallowed~"

"Hang in there, Susumu!" Neal charged at the Mii Trap. "We're not gonna let that thing make a meal out of you!" He smacked the Mii Trap with his claws... But suddenly, something inside the Mii Trap flinched.

"How are we gonna stop this thing without hurting Susumu?" Samuel asked.

Priff stood there with her eyes closed. Instead of attacking the Mii Trap herself, she simply stepped up to it. "Hey, Susumu," she said. "If you can hear me in there, try to stay calm. Conserve your air." She then turned back to Neal and Samuel. "...Stand back, you two. Kukukukuku..." A strange aura began to radiate from Priff's body. The Mii Trap's eyes began to dart around nervously. Somehow, it seemed to loosen its hold on Susumu.

"I think I see some red hair!" Neal pointed out, smacking the Mii Trap's stem so as not to hurt Susumu. "Come on, spit her out!"

This was when Priff saw her chance. She carefully crept up behind the Mii Trap, trying not to 'kukuku' too much as she did so. Once she was in position, she jabbed the Mii Trap with her fork as hard as she could, causing Susumu to come flying out of it's mouth. "Hurrgh!"

"Susumu!" Neal quickly made his way to her side. "Are you okay? You're... Ew, you're all covered in goop..."

Susumu sat up, her face and glasses now caked with sand. "Geh... What... WAS that thing?! Tried to..." She flopped back into the sand face-first. "I think I'm gonna be sick..."

"Hey, it's gonna be alright," Priff tried to comfort her. "You're all sandy now though. Let's get to the inn as soon as we can so you can have a bath."

"...Okay." Susumu stood up, shaking as much sand as she could off her glasses to avoid scratching them. "Let's get going, guys."

As the group made their way to the inn, however, Priff stopped to pick up the stems that the Mii Trap had left behind. "Kukuku... Don't look at me like that. I have a plan for these~"


	15. Act 2, Scene 6: Into The Land Of Fairies

It was already getting dark by the time the group reached the inn. Susumu got her hair washed, the group had a surprisingly large dinner for being out in the desert(granted, it was mostly scorpions and cactus juice), and now they were ready to settle in for the night.

Susumu was laying back down in her bed, thinking over the events of the day. I almost got eaten. I almost got poisoned. I almost became Jeremy's mindless servant for all eternity.

...Almost.

She shook her head, reminding herself that none of those things had ACTUALLY happened. Yeah, they had ALMOST happened, and what she remembered of it was terrifying, but her friends were there to back her up, weren't they? If the worst happened, she'd do the same for them...

...But what if they hadn't?

"Kukuku... Falling asleep already~?" Susumu's thoughts were broken by Priff's voice. "I... Made you something."

Priff handed Susumu a tray, and on it was a cup filled with a strange blue liquid. It smelled rather pleasant, but... "Eh... Thanks, Priff, but I've drank enough weird liquids for today," she started to turn it down.

"Just try it," Priff assured her. "Remember those Mii Trap stems I picked up? Well... It turns out you can actually make some pretty good tea from them, kuku~ Those things tried to eat you today. Now return the favor."

Susumu looked at the cup for a second. This... Was tea? It was such a bright blue color, it looked like it might stain her mouth, or...

She didn't think much longer before taking a drink of the odd liquid. "...Gaaah! B-Bitter! It's too bitter!" The "tea" was so bitter that it was starting to make her mouth go numb. As bitter as it was, though, it was also slightly sweet, and tasted a little bit flowery too. "...But... It's kinda good too!"

"Kukuku... I had a feeling you'd say that~" Priff was already ready to sleep, so she climbed into her own bed, but continued watching Susumu drink the rest of the tea. "Just leave the cup on the dresser."

Susumu quickly finished the rest of the tea, then put the cup on the dresser before huddling back under her blankets. She was exhausted from everything that happened, and now the tea was making her feel warm and sleepy... It seemed like Priff was already asleep by now, and it wasn't long before Susumu fell asleep herself...

However, not long after Susumu had fallen asleep did that same shadow start to creep into the inn. Priff was woken up by an odd force. "Kuu... Something isn't right." She hopped out of bed, seeing that Susumu was now shaking in her sleep again. "Must be having a nightmare..." Her body started to give off that strange aura again. "Don't worry. Your head will be cleared soo- KUKU!"

Priff choked when something suddenly grabbed her, however. "Oh, I'm afraid there's not much you can do for her at this point," said a very familiar voice. "Of course, after tonight, there won't be much she can do for you either! Ahahaha!" Azamir then scooped up Samuel and Neal and flew off into the night.

The next morning, Susumu woke up feeling terrible again. "Urgh, my head feels... ...Priff! Priff, are you there?! Wake up!"

No answer. No answer from Neal or Samuel either. "Ugh, again?!"

"Susumu!" Garaden's voice echoed in her ears. "Susumu, wake up! Azamir has-"

"Don't tell me," Susumu groaned. "Azamir took all my friends again? Not that I can do anything about it anyway."

"Not only that, but he seems to have erased your powers as well..." Garaden added. "But fear not, Susumu! I have a brand new set of powers for you, and I think you're going to like these!"

"Oooh! Let's see what I get now!"

"Haaa... HAAAA!" When the light faded, Susumu was wearing some sort of frilly, flouncy outfit. On top of her head there was a large bow, and she was now holding... A microphone?

"A... A Pop Star...?" Susumu squeaked, her face starting to turn red. "G-Garaden, wait, I can't accept this! I'll never make it as a Pop Star! I can't sing or dance or..."

But Garaden had already disappeared. Susumu sighed, and dragged herself out the door. Looks like she didn't have much of a choice...

END OF ACT 2


	16. Act 3, Scene 1: The First, Shari-Chan

Susumu just wanted to get out of the desert as soon as possible. She walked for what felt like hours, and the sand seemed to stretch on forever, until... She bumped into something.

"Augh! ...What is..." When Susumu looked up, she saw that she had bumped into... The biggest tomato she had ever seen. "I-Is this...?" Was this really happening? Giant blades of grass, living tomatoes... Was it all real? She put a hand on her head to make sure she wasn't just hallucinating from the heat. "Urgh... I hate tomatoes..."

She turned to walk away, but as she did, she was pushed by what seemed to be yet another tomato. This one, however, was different. This tomato had a face on it, and from the looks of things, it didn't seem happy about what she said.

"U-Um... I-I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were... Alive, you know? I-I didn't mean-"

The tomato didn't seem too eager to listen to her, and instead rolled into her, knocking her down. "Urgh! H-Hey! I said I was-!"

As the tomato was about to roll over her, however, she heard another voice. "Oh, don't hurt her, please! She didn't mean anything against you!"

The tomato stopped in its tracks, as the voice continued talking. "Please, let her go! She didn't want a fight! I... I actually think she might be sick or something..."

The tomato took another look at Susumu, before rolling off into the grass. "Urgh... Susumu stood up, dusting herself off. The voice was coming from a pink-haired girl in some sort of flower costume, in fact she resembled a cherry blossom more than anything. "Thank... Thanks for that," she thanked the girl. "Um, I'm not sick though. I just got out of the desert and I really don't like the heat... But, uh, who are you?"

The girl helped Susumu get up and introduced herself. "My name is Konade! I usually go walking through here when it's nice out... But I never expected to find another person here. What's your name?"

"I'm Susumu, and I'm on a mission to defeat the Dark Lord!" Susumu blurted. She probably shouldn't have said that, considering the look Konade gave her after.

"The... Dark Lord?" Konade seemed concerned. "And, you're going after him all by yourself?"

"I... I have to," Susumu said. "Azamir... He took my friends! If I don't get them back..."

"...Hey, Susumu? Why don't I go with you?" Konade offered. "That Dark Lord... I-I don't think you'll be able to beat him on your own. Besides, I know there's a town near here! I'm sure someone there can help us!"

"Yeah, I... Don't think I'll be able to either..." Susumu admitted. "But, there's a town nearby! What are we waiting for? Let's go there now!"

As soon as the two arrived in town, Susumu could've sworn that she saw someone hiding in one of the houses. "Hey! Excuse me! Can you help us? We're-"

"Eep!" Whoever it was, they ducked inside their house when Susumu approached. "N-no thank you! No one's home! Now- Now move along before..."

"Before... What?" Susumu was about to ask, until something caught her eye.

"Oh! Oh, terrible deeds! Someone has to help me!"

Susumu and Konade were about to check out what was happening, until they saw a blonde girl being swarmed by three boys. "Oh, Miss Shari-Chan!" said the boy in purple. "What makes you grace us with your presence today?"

"S-Saburo!" Shari-Chan gasped. "Kenji, Leon! I-It's my sisters! They- They've gone missing and-"

"Don't you worry about Miss Kari-Chan, Miss Shari-Chan!" Kenji tried to assure her. "She's so strong, she might even be stronger than you or Miss Gari-Chan!"

"Hey! No way!" Saburo exclaimed. "No one is stronger than Miss Gari-Chan!"

"Don't worry about them, Miss Shari-Chan," Leon scooter closer to Shari-Chan. "If anything happens, I'll protect you!"

"They're not listening to me..." Shari-Chan groaned, before catching sight of Susumu and Konade. "Oh, excuse me! You look like a couple of strong adventurers. Please, I need help! My name is Shari-Chan and-"

"We heard everything, Shari-Chan," Susumu stopped her.

"What happened to your sisters?" Konade asked.

"W-well... It all started when that Dark Lord Azamir attacked our village," Shari-Chan began. "My sisters and I stopped him, and they went off to make sure he hadn't done any damage to the rest of our land. But... They haven't come back yet. I-I'm so worried, but... I'm afraid to go it alone..."

"Hey, we're after the Dark Lord too!" Susumu declared. "Maybe we can help you find your sisters too?"

"Y-you'd do that for me?" Shari-Chan sniffed. "T-thank you."

"Where did you see your sisters last?" Konade asked.

"W-well... I don't know where Gari-Chan went," Shari-Chan admitted. "But! I know Kari-Chan went to Citrus Cave! If we're lucky, she might still be there!"

"Hey, I know where Citrus Cave is!" Konade stated, shaking her petal slightly. "That'll make things easier, won't it?"

"Citrus... Cave?" Susumu blinked in confusion.

"I think you'll really like it there, Susumu," Konade assured her. "Come on, you two, let's go find Kari-Chan!"


	17. Act 3, Scene 2: The Second, Kari-Chan

Once she got inside the Citrus Cave, Susumu was mesmerized. "Oh, wow! This whole place is made of oranges? Gosh, it smells really good here too!" It was true that Susumu didn't care much for oranges, but they did smell a lot better than tomatoes.

As they were walking, however, Susumu started to feel... Thirsty. "Urgh..." She trailed behind the group for a bit, until she finally stopped in front of some sort of pool. Konade and Shari-Chan weren't looking... "This stuff's just orange juice, right?" She knelt down and scooped some of the juice up with her hands.

Just as she was taking a drink, Konade caught sight of what she was doing. "Susumu, don't! That stuff isn't-"

Too late. Susumu scooped the juice into her mouth, and... It was one of the sweetest things she'd ever tasted, and yet it was also extremely refreshing! She took another drink. And another, and another. What she didn't notice, however, was that she was getting more and more transparent with each drink.

"Huh? W-where'd Susumu go?" Shari-Chan looked around nervously.

"Susumu!" Konade made her way over to where Susumu was sitting, but Susumu was nowhere to be found. "S-Susumu... You aren't supposed to drink the orange juice..."

"What are you talking about?" Susumu asked, still not realizing what had happened. "Come on, try some of- GAH!" It was hard to tell, but she was looking at her hands. "I-I can see right through myself! But- How?!"

"Oh dear, did Susumu drink the orange juice?" Shari-Chan asked, making her way over to the group.

Konade nodded. "She didn't know, did she? The orange juice here makes you invisible..."

"I-invisible...?" Susumu was starting to panic a bit. "Shari-Chan! A-am I gonna be like this forever?!"

"It's not permanent," Shari-Chan sighed. "But from the looks of it, you drank a lot of it. It may take a while before you're back to normal..."

"Well... Let's not worry about it too much, should we?" Konade asked nervously. "We'll... Just have to keep an eye on her, as it were."

"That's gonna be a tricky one," Shari-Chan mumbled, continuing on.

The group continued searching through the cave, until Susumu thought she saw someone in the distance. "Hey, look! I think I see something over there!"

"Over... Where?" Susumu was still invisible, and Konade couldn't see where she was pointing.

But it seemed like Shari-Chan saw it too. "Kari-Chan!" She called out, running over to her sister. "Kari-Chan, It's okay! We're here-"

And then Kari-Chan turned around. Shari-Chan was shocked enough to see that her sister's face had been stolen, but she also seemed to be warning the girls away from something.

Susumu screamed when she saw what that "something" was. Kari-Chan's face had been stolen by an enormous spider. Susumu was just starting to become visible again, and Konade could just barely see her clinging to her arm. "D-Don't like spiders, don't like spiders, don't like spiders..."

By the way Kari-Chan was reacting, it seemed like she didn't like spiders very much as well. Konade tried to comfort Susumu. "It'll be okay, Susumu! Just focus on saving Kari-Chan!" She swung her cherry branch at the spider.

"K-Kari-Chan..." Shari-Chan shook her head. Susumu and Kari-Chan were having a hard enough time as it was. She had to be strong. "This is for you, Kari-Chan!" Shari-Chan aimed her bow and fired an arrow at the spider.

Now it was Susumu's turn. Fortunately, she didn't have to get too close to the spider to attack. Instead she swung her microphone by its cord, using it as a whip to keep a safe distance away.

The spider seemed to notice that Susumu was keeping her distance, as well as how afraid she seemed to be. And that was when it decided to try something. It would bring the fight to HER instead. The spider reared up, then spit out a bunch of tiny spiders, all over Susumu.

Susumu screamed, louder than she ever had before, as she tried to shake the spiders off of herself. She wasn't sure what was causing it, but... Something was amplifying her voice. Even Konade and the Sharisharis had to cover their ears.

And that was when Konade noticed something. Susumu's screams... Were hurting the spider too? As much as she wanted to go and comfort Susumu, she also had to save Kari-Chan's face. She launched a wind attack at the spider, before focusing on Susumu. "Shari-Chan!" she tried to call out over Susumu's screaming. "This one's up to you!"

Shari-Chan stood up, trying to aim her bow once again. Her ears and head were ringing, making it even harder to focus. And yet, there was also something in her head. Something telling her that she couldn't miss. That she WOULDN'T miss. She fired one final shot at the spider, and that was it. "Kari-Chan! I... I took it down!"

"...Uwaaah! S-Shari-Chan! I... I was so scared!" Kari-Chan's face was back where it should be, and tears were streaming from her now-present eyes. "You... You saved my face! Thank you so much!"

"Kari-Chan... I-I'm just glad nothing worse happened to you!" Shari-Chan exclaimed. "And, I didn't do it alone. Susumu and Konade helped me."

Konade had finally gotten the spiders off of Susumu, and she had stopped screaming by now. "...Huh?" Susumu was confused. "But... I didn't help at all... All I did was mess things up..."

"But you did help!" Konade assured her. "Somehow... I don't know how, but... Your screams ended up hurting that thing."

"But..." Kari-Chan started crying again. "G-Gari-Chan is still missing! She went to Bigg Forest, but... She isn't back yet! I would've gone after her myself, but..."

"Don't worry, Kari-Chan!" Susumu stood up. "Konade and I, we'll go with you!"

"What about you, Shari-Chan?" Konade asked. "Are you going with us?"

"Um... A-actually... I can't," Shari-Chan admitted. "I have to stay and make sure Azamir doesn't come back to the village. Kari-Chan, will you be okay without me?"

"Yep, yep!" Kari-Chan assured her sister. "I got Konade and Susumu with me, so I'm not afraid to go to Bigg Forest!"

"We should probably get going now," Konade stated. "If your face got stolen, Kari-Chan, that might mean that Gari-Chan's did too. Not to mention, I think Susumu's had enough of this place for one day."

Susumu nodded, and the girls made their way back out of the cave. Once they were out, Shari-Chan headed back to the village, while Kari-Chan stayed with the girls. "Okay! It's easy to get lost in Bigg Forest, so just keep close to me, okay?"

"Sounds good to me, Kari-Chan," Susumu agreed. "Okay, everyone, we're going to find Gari-Chan now!"

"...Just no more spiders, please..."


	18. Act 3, Scene 3: The Third, Gari-Chan

Kari-Chan seemed to have calmed down a lot now that she was found, and the girls had a hard time keeping up with her on the way to Bigg Forest. "You guys are really gonna like Gari-Chan!" she exclaimed. "She's so cool and mature and she takes care of us and..."

"It sounds like the Sharisharis really love each other..." Susumu mumbled. She wondered if her friends were worried about her too. "I wonder how everyone else is feeling... I wonder if they're thinking about me too..."

Konade seemed concerned. "Susumu? Who... Are you talking to?"

Before Susumu could answer, however, Kari-Chan spoke up again. "Hey, hey! We're here!" she announced. "Gari-Chan's in here somewhere! We gotta go save big sister! Don't be afraid, okay? I'll be right by you!"

But Kari-Chan yelped when she heard what sounded like a voice. "D-do you all hear that?! I-It's gotta be a monster!"

Konade listened a bit closer. "...No... No, it... It sounds like a person! Like... Someone singing?"

Susumu listened as closely as she could, and now she could hear the singing as well: "Ra ra ra ra..."

"That sounds... Like Ariel?! But... What's she doing out here?" Susumu began to move forward on her own, following the song.

"Who is... Ariel?" Konade and Kari-Chan were confused by Susumu's behavior, and followed her further into the forest.

Susumu and the girls followed the sounds to some sort of clearing in the forest. "Hey, look!" she called out to the others. "There's someone here, and she's singing!"

In the middle of the clearing stood what seemed to be a very tall girl, wearing a long gown and tiara. She was singing to a group of Lureshrooms, and yet, they didn't seem hostile towards her at all. "Ra ra ra... Ra ra ra ra..."

"That was wonderful!" Konade suddenly blurted, causing the girl to turn around. The girls were shocked to see that she wasn't human at all! In fact, she was some sort of tall metal creature, with odd, glassy, square-shaped eyes.

The girl flashed a sharp-toothed smile. "Thanking of you muchly!" she thanked Konade. "To be certain, Bowyetta was not knowing anyone had been listening of her... But she is much glad you were enjoying! ...Who you are being anyway?"

"Oh! My name is Susumu, and this is Konade," Susumu introduced the girls. "And you must be Bowyetta, right?"

"Um, I'm Kari-Chan!" Kari-Chan spoke up. "We're looking for big sister Gari-Chan! She came here but she isn't back yet!"

"Oh! Bowyetta is knowing what you are meaning!" Bowyetta announced. "She is thinking she is having seen Miss Gari-Chan around here somewhere..."

"Can you take us to her, Bowyetta?" Konade asked. "Shari-Chan and Kari-Chan are very worried about her!"

Bowyetta nodded. "Yes! Bowyetta is knowing just where Miss Gari-Chan is!" Bowyetta answered. Before she led the girls off, however, she turned back to the group of Lureshrooms. "Bowyetta is being finished with singing now! Thanking of you all muchly for coming!" Once all the Lureshrooms had left, Bowyetta began to lead the girls to where she last saw Gari-Chan.

The girls walked through the forest for what felt like forever, until they came to another clearing. Sure enough, Gari-Chan was standing there. "B-Big sister Gari-Chan!" Kari-Chan called out to her. "Shari-Chan and I have been- Uwaah!"

Gari-Chan then turned around to warn her sister, revealing that her face had been stolen as well. "Gari-Chan, your face!" Susumu exclaimed. "Where is it? What has it?!"

Gari-Chan motioned for the others to follow her, and pointed to some sort of large bird, complete with Gari-Chan's face stuck to it. "Gari-Chan's face!" Konade got ready to attack. "Get ready everyone! We're going to have to fight it out!"

Bowyetta looked terrified as soon as she said that. "B-But... Bowyetta is not much liking to be fighting..." she squeaked. She changed her mind, however, as soon as she saw the look on Kari-Chan's face. It was for the sake of Gari-Chan, wasn't it? She took out her fan and swung it in the air, sending a wave to attack the bird.

That single hit alone seemed to do a serious amount of damage to the bird, but now it was preparing for an attack. It reared back its head and... Lightly tapped Susumu on her forehead.

"...Was... That seriously it?" Susumu was surprised at how... Weak the bird ended up being. She swung her microphone at the bird again, finishing it off with just another hit.

The girls could only stare in disbelief as Gari-Chan's face was restored. "I thought that thing would be a lot stronger..." Konade mumbled.

"B-big sister?" Kari-Chan seemed concered for her sister.

"...GARADEN, I LOVE BEIN' AN OWL!" Gari-Chan turned to face the stunned crowd. "...Eh? Oh, I'm terribly sorry about that, dears."

"B-Big sister!" Kari-Chan began crying again. "I-I was so scared!"

"Oh, Kari-Chan, come here, dear," Gari-Chan said softly, taking her sister into her arms, before looking up at the girls. "I must thank you all for looking after Kari-Chan for me. But, where is Shari-Chan?"

"She's waiting for you two back at the village," Susumu explained. "And, the three of us... We need to go stop that Dark Lord! He has my friends!"

"Oh, is that so?" Gari-Chan stopped to think for a moment. "Well, dears, you just might be in luck! My sisters and I can help you, but... We need all three of us to be together for this. Kari-Chan, let's get Shari-Chan and go to the east end of town. I know just how we can help our new friends!"

Kari-Chan nodded, and followed her sister back to town. The girls looked at each other before heading back themselves, deciding it would be best not to comment on the situation.


	19. Act 3, Scene 4: Tank!

The girls met at the easternmost part of the Elven Retreat, in front of some sort of large gate. "Oh, there you are, dears!" Gari-Chan greeted them. "I suppose you're ready to go after that Dark Lord now?"

"We're ready, Gari-Chan!" Susumu confirmed. "But... How do we open this gate?"

"That's where we come in!" Shari-Chan chimed. "Just stand back and let the Sharishari Triplets do their magic! Are you ready, girls?"

"Ready!" Kari-Chan and Gari-Chan said in unison.

The girls took their positions in front of the gate, and Shari-Chan began a count. "One... Two... Three!" On her signal, the three girls started dancing. Susumu felt completely mesmerized by their dance! She didn't know what it was about it, but she could feel her own body moving unconsciously as she watched.

Once the girls finished dancing, the gate began to open up. Waiting right behind it was...

"Ahahaha. So this is the famed Elven Retreat I've heard so much about."

"AZAMIR!" All 6 girls got ready to fight, even Kari-Chan.

"Oh, Sharisharis," Azamir said in a condescending tone. "I just knew you'd be helping that little pain in my nonexistant neck. But you know what they say. When one door closes, another one is sure to open. And you've certainly opened the door for me, ahahaha!" He began to open his eyes, and a pink light filled the room.

"Eeek!" When the light faded, Kari-Chan and Gari-Chan were okay, but Shari-Chan... "S-Shari-Chan! He took Shari-Chan's face!" Kari-Chan began sobbing.

Gari-Chan leaned in to comfort her sister. "Now, now, Kari-Chan. If it makes you feel any better, I will go find her face, and you can stay here with Shari-Chan."

"Y-you will?" Kari-Chan sniffed. "But... Susumu and her friends..."

"We will be helping of Miss Gari-Chan also!" Bowyetta spoke up.

"Yeah, I wanna help Shari-Chan too!" Susumu added.

"Well, I guess that settles that then," Konade said with a smile. "Come on, let's go get Shari-Chan's face back!"

And so the four girls set out to reclaim Shari-Chan's face. As they were searching, however, they heard a voice nearby. "Alright, where is he?!"

The girls looked around in confusion. "Was... Anybody else hearing of that?"

Susumu pointed to something in the distance. "Taaank! ...N-No, I mean he's literally a tank."

And sure enough, someone who seemed to be wearing armor like a tank was yelling at a butterfly. "If you don't tell me where that Dark Lord is, I'm gonna have to get angry!"

Once the girls got closer, they could see that the butterfly had Alonzo's face on it. "Oh no! Susumu, I think Azamir got more faces than we expected!"

"Hey, be careful!" Susumu cautioned the person, swinging her microphone at the butterfly. "That thing is dangerous!"

As the girls began to fight the butterfly, the person in armor revealed himself. He was... Actually a dog?! "H-Hey! What's happening?!" he demanded, looking around in confusion. "I was just about to find out where that Dark Lord went!"

"Bowyetta is not much thinking we can not be talking to these things!" Bowyetta called out to him as she threw a wave at the butterfly. "We must be fighting of them!"

The dog still seemed confused, but fired a few shots from his cannon at the butterfly anyway. For someone his size, he was a lot stronger than he looked! And yet... Even after the butterfly was defeated, he kept trying to talk to Alonzo's face. "Hey, wait! You better tell me where the Dark Lord went now!"

"You know, we could just tell you ourselves..." Susumu mumbled.

"Miss Susumu is being right! We are be looking for the Dark Lord ourselves!"

"But..." Konade began. "Before we go after Azamir... Shouldn't we see if we stole any more faces first?"

"Yes, and we must be getting Miss Shari-Chan of her face also," Bowyetta added.

"Actually, now that you mention it, I think I saw three more faces around here," the dog stated. "They went... Yeah, they went that way!"

"Three faces at once?!" Susumu exclaimed. "That's gonna be pretty hard, isn't it?"

"Not to worry, not to worry!" The dog declared. "I will be right here to protect you, my dear ladies!"

The girls gave each other an odd look. "Right..." Konade answered. "Well, could you take us to them, Mr...?"

"Raya! My name is Raya!" The dog attempted to bow while introducing himself, but his armor got in the way. "And I would be very happy to lead the way. Follow me, my dears!"

With that, Raya rolled off towards where he saw the other stolen faces. "He is certainly much being interesting, is he not?" Bowyetta asked.

"I like him," Susumu said. "He seems... Fun." She began to follow Raya. Bowyetta and Konade gave each other a look, but soon followed the two as well.


	20. Act 3, Scene 5: The Amazing Tomato Bros

The group continued searching and searching for the rest of the missing faces. And searching. ...And searching.

"...Bleh... Four more faces?" Susumu groaned. "How are we gonna find all of them now?"

Bowyetta took a look around. "Is much to be getting dark out now," she stated. "How we are to be finding of anyone like this?'

Konade stopped to think for a moment, looking at her surroundings. After a while, she began pulling up one of the large blades of grass. "Hey, I think we could make a tent out of these!"

Raya then rolled over to a very large tomato, pushing it over to the girls. "And look at all these fruits we've got! And those big raindrop things are clean enough to drink... What do you girls say to a camping trip?"

Raya and Bowyetta began constructing a makeshift tent and sleeping bags from grass and leaves, while Susumu and Konade went out to gather food. By the time they had gotten everything set up, it was almost completely dark out.

"Phew... Well, the tent's all set up!" Raya proudly declared. "How'd you girls do?"

Konade looked around nervously. "Well..." she began. "Most of what we found is tomatoes..." She then looked at Susumu, whose face said everything.

"Urgh... I hate tomatoes..."

"...Alright. Just wait here for a second," Raya said, before rolling off into the dark. Konade tried to stop him, but seeing how sick Susumu looked, she thought it better to stay with her.

After a few minutes, Raya's voice could be heard again. "Hey, Susumu!" he called out. "Got something for ya!" Raya rolled back up to the campsite, carrying what seemed to be a large brown mushroom.

"Is... That really safe to eat?" Konade wrinkled her nose. "It's all brown, and we don't even know how long it's been here..."

Susumu quickly took the mushroom, stabbing a stick through it and holding it over the fire. "Anything is better than tomatoes," she mumbled.

Once Susumu was sure the mushroom was thoroughly cooked, she took it out of the fire and prepared to taste it. Konade seemed concerned about this. "Susumu, you don't have to eat that thing if you don't want to..."

But before she could finish, Susumu took a bite. She didn't like mushrooms very much, but somehow, this actually... Tasted pretty good! "Mmph!" She didn't know how to describe the flavor, and it tasted a bit like charcoal due to the fire, but it certainly was edible.

"I... guess that means it's okay!" Raya commented. "See, I told ya it'd be fine. And hey, Susumu doesn't have to eat tomatoes now!"

The group continued talking and having fun through the night, and they even cooked bananas and marshmallows for dessert. Eventually, however, the group began to grow tired, and so they put out their fire and went into their tent to sleep.

As the group was settling into their sleeping bags, however, Konade turned back to Raya. "Raya... You DID remember to wash that mushroom, didn't you?"

"...Uhhh..." Before he could properly answer her, however, the group heard... Someone giggling to themselves. "Eh? ...Susumu? Susumu, are you alright?"

Susumu continued giggling to herself for a moment, until she finally composed herself enough to speak. "S-sorry! Can't... Stop it!"

Konade sighed. "I knew she shouldn't have eaten that thing... Raya, I think she might have eaten a Smileshroom, and from the sound of things she swallowed some spores too. It's not going to hurt her, but... She won't be able to stop laughing for a while."

"S-sorry!" Susumu managed to get out. "Try to..." She tried to hold in her laughter, but this only seemed to make it build up. Eventually, she couldn't hold it any longer, and burst out laughing even louder than before.

Bowyetta seemed to be very uncomfortable with this. "How we are going to be sleeping?"

Konade sat up with a groan. "Come on, Bowyetta, let's go sleep outside. Raya, you get along with Susumu best. You stay with her."

"Wha-?! Why do I have to-" Raya was about to protest, but he stopped once he saw the look on Konade's face. Bowyetta and Konade dragged their sleeping bags outside, and Raya stayed in the tent with Susumu. "Er... A-alright, just calm down. Come on, we've gotta get to sleep, alright?"

It took Raya a while to get Susumu calmed down, but once he did the two were able to get to sleep rather quickly. In the morning, however, Bowyetta woke up to see three strange faces staring right at her. "Eek!"

"B-Bowyetta!" The scream woke up Konade, who looked up to see three tomatoes of varying sizes, with the faces of Saburo, Kenji, and Leon. "U-uh-oh! They must have smelled the tomatoes we were cooking last night! We're so sorry, we were-"

Before Konade could finish, however, the largest tomato rolled into the tent, knocking it down and waking up Susumu and Raya in the process. "W-what was that?!"

"We've got to fight three of them now, you two!" Konade instructed. "I'll take the mid-sized one! Bowyetta, you get the small one, and Susumu and Raya take the big one!"

Bowyetta nodded, and hurled a gust of air at the small tomato. The rest of the group took their positions and began fighting.

Konade didn't have a while lot of trouble with the Kenji tomato, and even Bowyetta was able to take down the Leon tomato with ease. However, Susumu and Raya seemed to struggle a bit with the Saburo tomato. Susumu would have finished it herself, but as she was rearing up for the final hit, the tomato opened its mouth and spit tomato juice all over her.

"Urgh!" The smell of tomatoes started to fill Susumu's nose again. It was making her feel horribly sick. So sick she couldn't even fight anymore.

"Miss Susumu!" Bowyetta was about to finish the tomato for Susumu, until it spit tomato juice on her as well. "Eww! Bowyetta is thinking it have gotten in her hair!"

Okay, so Susumu and Bowyetta both hated tomatoes. This time, Konade made her move. "I've never eaten a raw tomato in my life!" She declared. "Maybe I can-"

Nope. The tomato spit juice all over her too, and as it turned out, she also ended up hating it. And now Raya was all that was left. "W-we can't beat this thing!" he exclaimed. "Haven't you ever seen Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes before?!"

But when the tomato reared up to spit juice at him...

"It's..." Raya's eyes lit up as soon as he tasted the juice. "D-delicious!" The tomato looked shocked as it saw the look on Raya's face. He actually LIKED this stuff? Raya fired off one final hit to the tomato, and as Saburo's face flew away... He began eating what was left of it.

The girls watched in horror as Raya ate the entire tomato. "Phew... Now that's what I call a balanced breakfast!" He said jokingly.

"R-Raya... You just..." Konade was too stunned to even say anything.

"...Huh? Just... What?" Raya looked around in confusion, tomato juice still dripping down his face.

"Urgh... Nevermind... Let's just... Go get Shari-Chan's face now." She began moving in the direction of the Lotus Lake, but stopped when she remembered something.

"...But first we'd all better get a shower."


	21. Act 3, Scene 6: Sharisharichan

After a horrifying night of camping and tomatoes, it was nice to have a moment of peace. As the group walked through the Lotus Lake, they couldn't help but stare in awe, and event Raya was silenced by the sight. "Much beautiful is being..."

"Be careful not to get distracted now," Konade cautioned them. "We still have to keep an eye out for Shari-Chan's face."

"Eep!" Susumu suddenly bumped into something while she was looking around. "S-sorry!" She apologized. "I didn't mean to- AHHH!"

And then she screamed when she saw what she had bumped into. Laying right in front of Susumu's face was some sort of giant blue frog creature. It looked like it could easily swallow her up, and considering the Mii Traps earlier, it probably would.

"Hey, it's alright, Susumu," Raya tried to comfort her. "Look, that thing doesn't have a face stuck to it. It's not gonna attack us!"

No sooner had he said that, however, than Shari-Chan's face did appear and stuck itself to the frog.

"...I may have just jinxed us."

Konade rolled her eyes, and swung her cherry branch at the frog. "Well, it looks like we'll have to fight it out now!"

Raya fired a few shots from his cannon, and Bowyetta flung another gust of air at the frog. "Urgh..." They hadn't been fighting for very long, and Raya was already starting to look tired.

Susumu noticed this, and quickly made her way to Raya's side. "Come on, Raya!" she cheered him on. "We've gotta keep fighting!"

"Whoa!" Suddenly, Raya felt a lot less tired! "Thanks, Susumu!" This time, he began charging up a laser attack and firing at the frog.

As the frog rolled up to attack Bowyetta, she let out a scream. At the sound of her scream, however, something flew out of her hair. Two things, in fact. It looked like a pair of hovering arrows, except... They had dog faces! "This way, Bowyetta~!" one of them instructed her, moving her out of the way before she got hit.

The battle went on for a bit longer, and just as the group thought they had won, the frog decided to try something. The frog inhaled a large breath, and spewed out a horrible-smelling green cloud.

Konade could feel her petals drooping. "Urgh! W-what IS that?!"

Susumu REALLY felt like she was going to be sick this time. This smelled worse than the tomatoes. Bowyetta tried to fan the cloud away from herself.

In a moment of desperation, however, Raya quickly scooped up Susumu. "Augh! R-Raya-" She was interrupted when he suddenly shoved her into his cannon.

"What you are doing?!"

"Saving us!"

"Raya, why did-"

Before Konade could finish, however, Raya fired Susumu out of his cannon, nailing the frog right in Shari-Chan's face. "Direct hit!"

"Raya..." Konade sighed. "Did you really have to do that?"

"Hey, I saved Shari-Chan's face, didn't I?!" Raya snapped. "I'm sure Susumu's fine, anyway! See, you're okay, aren't you, Susumu?"

Susumu, meanwhile, was dunking her head in the water, trying to keep herself from throwing up. "...Eh?"

"Oh, never mind," Konade groaned, helping Susumu stand up. "I'm worried about the Sharisharis. Were Kari-Chan and Gari-Chan okay while we were gone?"

"It looked like Azamir left after he took everyone's faces," Susumu stated. "I don't think he got any more faces from here..."

"Then what are we waiting for?! Let's go after that stupid Dark Lord!" He then rolled off back towards the village.

Bowyetta quickly followed after Raya, but Konade looked concerned. "Are you going to be alright, Susumu?"

"Trust me, I... Went through a lot worse in the desert," Susumu answered. "I don't want to talk about it. Anyway, he's right. Maybe the Sharisharis can help us again." With that, the two headed back toward the village after their friends.


	22. Act 3, Scene 7: Farewell To The Fairies

"Susumu!" No sooner did the group arrive back at the gate were they pounced on by Kari-Chan. "S-Shari-Chan is... You..."

"Susumu!" Shari-Chan bounded over to the group, her face now back to where it belonged. "It's alright, we're all okay now, thanks to all of you!"

Gari-Chan stepped up to take her place next to her sisters. "Yes, we owe quite a bit to Susumu and her friends, don't we?"

"Um, Miss Gari-Chan?" Bowyetta asked. "We are much need to be going after Dark Lord Azamir..."

"Oh, yes, that's right!" Gari-Chan exclaimed. "Girls, if you're ready. We'll need to reopen the door for Susumu."

"Okay!" Kari-Chan and Shari-Chan declared.

Gari-Chan then turned back to Susumu. "Susumu. This time, why don't you and your friends help us open the door?"

Susumu's eyes widened. "Y-you really mean it?" she squeaked. "But... I-I'm really not that good at dancing..."

"Hey, don't worry about it!" Raya tried to assure her. "You don't need to be good to dance. Just feel it!"

"J-just..." Before Susumu could process what was happening, the music started up again and the Sharisharis began dancing. Bowyetta, Konade, and Raya joined in, but Susumu hung back for a second. After a bit, however, she couldn't help it anymore. She suddenly... Felt compelled to dance too!

Once the group finished dancing, the gate began to open up once more. "O-oh! We did it!" Kari-Chan exclaimed.

Gari-Chan smiled at her sisters, and turned back to Susumu. "Right. Susumu, if it's all the same to you, my sisters and I will leave the Dark Lord in your hands. As for us, we're going to stay here and keep an eye on the village."

"But don't forget to come back and visit us, okay?" Shari-Chan asked. "You gotta tell us all about how you beat the Dark Lord!"

"That's okay, Gari-Chan," Susumu agreed. "I promise you all, I'm gonna beat the Dark Lord!"

"Good luck, everyone!" Kari-Chan called out to the group. Once she was sure they were gone, she turned back to her sisters. "...Um, Gari-Chan? Do you think Susumu is gonna be okay?"

"I'm certain that she will," Gari-Chan assured her. "Susumu... She isn't alone in this. She's getting help from someone very special. Someone... Someone who holds great power over this world."

"Someone... With power?"

"It's okay, Kari-Chan," Shari-Chan said. "I know exactly what Gari-Chan is talking about."

Later that night, however, it seemed that Azamir had differwent plans for Susumu.

"...GAH!" Raya suddenly woke up in the middle of the night. "Geez, my hair feels sweaty..." He sighed in relief once he realized he was dreaming.

As he settled back into his bed to go back to sleep, however, he noticed something out of the corner of his eye. Susumu was shaking in her sleep? He got up out of his bed to check on her. "Hey! Susumu, wake up! You're just dreaming!"

When Susumu wouldn't wake up, however, Raya darted out of the room. "Hey! Girls, wake up! Susumu is- Gah!"

And that was when the strange shadow grabbed him. When Azamir spoke, he sounded slightly annoyed. "Your little hero is far more persistant than I expected. But not to worry. I'm certain that this will finally take care of her once and for all. Ahahahaha..." With that Azamir grabbed Konade and Bowyetta and disappeared into the night.

The next morning Susumu woke up feeling even worse than before. More than that, however, her eyes were filled with tears. "Ugh, don't tell me..."

"Um... Susumu?" Garaden's voice echoed in her head. "I-I do hate to trouble you again, but... Well, you've already realized what's happened, haven't you?"

"Yeah," Susumu groaned, getting out of her bed. "This is seriously getting old..."

"Yes, but!" Garaden continued. "Look at yourself now, Susumu. Azamir was unable to erase your powers this time! And, if you would look at the window for a moment? Do you see that shadow in the distance? You've almost reached the Dark Lord's castle!"

"Wait, seriously?" Susumu took a look out the window. "The Dark Lord's castle... Do you think everyone is being held there?" She looked a bit nervous, however, when she saw the volcanic landscape of the surrounding area. She didn't do so well in extreme temperatures...

"...Susumu." Garaden's voice echoed once again. "Do not be afraid. Your powers will protect you against the Dark Lord's forces. And what's more, there are many people who are very special waiting for you. Go forth, and save them!"

Somehow, Garaden's words helped Susumu feel better about this whole thing. "...Thanks, Garaden," she said, before heading out the door. As she stared at the castle in the distance, she called out to her friends. "Hold on, everyone! I'm gonna find you! That's a promise!"

END OF ACT 3


	23. Act 4, Scene 1: A Walk Amongst Gods

As Susumu approached the castle, however, a feeling of hopelessness started to come over her. She hadn't made it this far on her own. She was no hero. She had so many other people helping her up until now... There was no way she could save everyone by herself.

"Susumu!" Suddenly, a screech broke through her thoughts. "Are you alright? Azamir... Did he bring you here too?"

Susumu looked up to see... "Martcha...?" she asked, trying to hide the tears in her eyes. "W-what are you doing here?"

"I... I sensed something was wrong around here," Martcha answered. "Somehow, I had a feeling you would be here. But..." She looked concerned. "What about you? Did... Did Azamir hurt you?"

Susumu shook her head. "But, I-I'm here because..." Tears started to fill her eyes. "Azamir... He... He took all my friends. I-I want them back! But... I don't think I can do this on my own..."

Martcha landed on Susumu's shoulder to comfort her. "Susumu. It is not coincidence that we met here," she began. "As you may know, I know all about destiny, and... I feel as though it was ours to see each other again. Together, I know we can save your friends."

Susumu looked up at her. "You... Would really help me?" she asked.

"Of course," Martcha answered. "It's... Difficult to explain, but... I have a very strong connection to the things that live on this planet. That includes you and your friends, Susumu."

"M-Martcha... Thank you," she sighed.

Martcha nodded, taking off into the air again. "Now, where do you suppose your friends might be?"

"I... Don't even know," Susumu admitted. "I was just... Going to head towards Azamir's castle and see where that took me..."

"If that's the case, then to Azamir's castle we go!" Martcha declared, surprising Susumu with her enthusiasm. "Come on, let's go free everyone! And smile a little bit, okay? You're going to get to see everyone again soon!"

It wasn't long after they had started searching, however, that Susumu saw a familiar figure in the distance. "Hey!" she pointed at the figure. "Is that-"

As soon as Raya heard Susumu's voice, he turned around to warn her away. When he did so, however, he also revealed that his face had been stolen. "R-Raya!" Susumu and Martcha quickly made their way to Raya's side. "W-where's your face...?"

"Susumu!" Martcha called out. "We've got trouble!" When Susumu turned around, Martcha was firing a green beam at a slime that had Raya's face on it. "We have to defeat this thing to save Raya!"

Susumu nodded, and swung her microphone at the slime. Somehow, with Martcha fighting alongside her, she felt a lot more... Sure of herself, as it were. Martcha was a lot stronger than Susumu expected. She was starting to get a bit flustered at how strong she was, in fact. Not that she doubted her when she said she was a god, but-

And suddenly Susumu was caught off guard when the slime hit her while she was thinking. "Susumu!" Martcha gasped. "A-are you okay?! Um... Let me..." She twirled her staff around a bit, surrounding Susumu in a green light.

As the green light enveloped Susumu, she suddenly felt a lot stronger than before! She stood up, twirling her microphone again. "T-thank you, Martcha!" She gave one last swing of her microphone, taking out the slime and freeing Raya's face.

Susumu took a look at Raya, concern filling her eyes. "R-Raya...?"

"...Wan!" Raya jumped up in excitement as his face returned. "Susumu! That was amazing! You're a hero!"

"No, not really," Susumu sighed. "I didn't save you all by myself. I had some help from Martcha."

Raya's eyes grew as big as saucers when he heard that. "Martcha?!" He demanded. "You're... being trained by the Great Sage herself?! Aww, man! That's so cool! Wish Martcha would train me too..."

"Hey, uh, how did you even get here?" Susumu asked.

"Um... I dunno!" Raya answered. "Azamir just kinda dropped me here... And when I tried to attack him, he took my face and stuck it on that blob thing! I dunno who he thinks he is, but that's low! Where did he go anyway?! Come on, I'm gonna take him down myself!"

"Well, we're not just gonna leave you here," Susumu said. "And we're headed up to the castle ourselves. You, me, and Martcha, we've still gotta find everyone else!"

Raya then looked up at Martcha, his eyes sparkling like two sparkly green things. "Hey, Martcha? Does this mean you're gonna train me too?"

Martcha put a paw on her chin. "Well, I don't see why not... We'll all need to work our hardest to defeat the Dark Lord..."

Raya's tail started wagging harder than ever when he heard that. "Wahoo! You hear that, Susumu? We're the Great Sage's apprentices now!"

"Um, excuse me," Martcha spoke up again. "Before we celebrate, did you happen to see anyone else around here?"

Raya stopped to think for a minute. "Actually, yeah, I did!" He finally answered. "There was another dog who was even smaller than me! And he was with a girl in purple..."

"That sounds like Priff and Vinny," Susumu stated. "If Raya had his face taken, that means... We have to save them too!"

"Priff... And Vinny?" Raya was confused.

"You'll get to meet them soon," Susumu said. "They're really cool."

"Can you lead us to them?" Martcha asked.

Raya gave a nod. "I sure can!" He confirmed. "I don't know how many more of us there are, but I wanna help save everyone too!" And with that, he rolled off, leaving the girls behind.

"He has so much energy, doesn't he?"

"Yeah, but not nearly as much as Neal does. Anyway, we better go get Priff and Vinny!"

And so the group pressed on, drawing ever closer to the Dark Lord's castle.


	24. Act 4, Scene 2: Priffect Vindication

Fortunately, it didn't take too long for the group to find Priff and Vinny. In fact, it seemed like the two had already found each other by the time they got there. They were sitting outside some sort of cave, both looking very calm despite having lost their faces. As soon as Vinny noticed Susumu approaching, he looked up and waved at her.

"Priff! Vinny!" Susumu called out. "You're... Okay! And... Oddly calm about this whole thing."

"You knew Susumu would be coming for you, didn't you?" Martcha asked.

Priff and Vinny nodded, then Vinny stood up and walked over to Raya, giving his head a slight tilt. Raya seemed confused by this. "Um, hi! My name's Raya. Are... You Vinny?"

Martcha took Vinny's hand, before going over and taking Priff's. "We can save the introductions for later," she said. "Right now, we need to go find your faces."

"Oh, right!" Susumu exclaimed. "Do you two know where your faces are?"

Priff and Vinny nodded again, and led the group off to where their faces had been taken. Vinny's face had been stuck to a golem similar to the ones they fought in the pyramid, but... Susumu hung back slightly when she saw that Priff's face had been stuck to a storm cloud.

Priff noticed how Susumu was acting, and held out her fork to the girl. Susumu just stared at it for a few seconds. "Uhh, thanks, Priff," she declined politely. "but you might need that soon, so just hold onto it, okay?"

Priff nodded, and the group got into battle positions. Susumu, however, still hung back. She really didn't want to fight that cloud... She really didn't want anyone to get zapped or...

"Susumu!" Raya called out. "I'll take the cloud! You and Martcha just get Vinny's face!"

Martcha fired a green beam at the golem, but Susumu still hung back. Raya wasn't doing so well against the cloud himself, and even Martcha seemed to be having trouble with the golem.

But that was when Susumu got an idea. She had done this before, back in the Realm Of The Fey... but would it work a second time? "Uh... Guys?" Susumu spoke up. "You... Might wanna cover your ears for a second."

"Cover our-" Martcha seemed confused by this, but Raya quickly curled up inside his armor. He knew EXACTLY what Susumu was about to do. Susumu took her microphone with both hands and screamed into it as loudly as she could.

Ouch. Now Martcha knew what Susumu was talking about. From the looks of things, however, it wasn't just painful for Susumu and her friends, but also for the enemies as well! Martcha took this as an opportunity to deliver a finishing strike to the golem, freeing Vinny's face, and leaving the cloud to Susumu and Raya.

At least, the two COULD have handled the cloud together. That is, however, until Vinny stepped in. "...Hey. Hey, um..." he began. "...Thanks for getting me my face back."

Susumu gave him a gentle smile. "It's really no problem, Vinny," she said. "But... Right now we have to get Priff's face back, and..."

Vinny had already started doing something with his frying pan as she spoke. "All taken care of," he responded, holding the pan out to her. "Here. Eat this."

Susumu gave him an odd stare, but decided to eat what she was offered anyway. It took a few seconds for her to realize what had happened, but once she did... "EEEK!" Fire started spewing from Susumu's mouth and into the cloud.

Raya glared at Vinny. "What'd you make her do that for?!" he demanded.

Vinny shrugged off the scolding. "Hey. She likes spicy food, doesn't she? And look. That got Priff her face back."

Sure enough, Priff was staring at her reflection in her fork. "Kukuku... I'm back, everyone~"

Martcha hovered over the group nervously. "Are you all okay?" she squeaked.

Priff was "kukuku"ing to herself, and Raya was glaring at Vinny, who was standing there with his eyes closed. Susumu, however, was on the ground gasping for air. "Need... Water..." she gasped.

Priff looked up from her fork, making her way over to Susumu. "Don't worry about it~" she tried to assure her. "There's an inn inside that cave. We can all rest in there."

"An inn... In a cave?" Raya's eyebrows shot up at the sound of that.

"You'd be surprised at some of the places I've slept~" Priff responded.

"Well, we can't rest for too long," Susumu mumbled. "We've still got six more people left to find." She looked up at the cave. "There's... Someone I'm worried about. Go on then, Priff. Take us to that inn."

And so Priff led the group onward, into the depths of the volcanic cave. Susumu knew things were only going to get hotter from here on out.

"Yardi... What did Azamir do to you?"


	25. Act 4, Scene 3: The Mighty Cerberus

After getting some rest at the nearby inn, the group headed into the cave. Susumu's eyes widened, however, when she saw that the cave was full of lava. Upon noticing her worried expression, Martcha spoke up. "Susumu? Is... Everything okay?"

Susumu suddenly jumped at the sounds of Martcha's voice. "Eh? ...Oh, it's... Everything's fine!" she panicked. "It's just... I don't really do so well with extreme temperatures... And heat tends to make me..."

As she was talking, however, Raya's ears perked up. He thought he could hear... Some sort fo rumbling. Almost like something was...

"! Susumu! Look out!"

"Eh?!" Susumu was suddenly shoved out of the way by Raya, as part of the cave's roof came crashing down.

"Susumu!" Martcha screeched, quickly dashing over to her side. "Are you okay?!"

"Yeah..." Susumu said, sitting up. "But... Where's Priff and Vinny?"

"Kukukuku..." Priff's laugh could be heard even from the other side of the rock. "Seems like we've been split up~"

"Split up?!" Raya shouted. "How are we gonna get back together?!"

Vinny just closed his eyes and continued walking. "Looks like we'll just have to keep going," he said.

Priff followed along behind Vinny, and Susumu turned back to Martcha and Raya. "Well, you heard the dog," she sighed. "We'll just have to keep going and see if we can catch up." As the group set off, Susumu couldn't help but feel grateful that she had Martcha and Raya with her.

Priff and Vinny walked through the cave for what seemed like hours. Eventually, however, they came across a very familiar figure. A short person with red hair, wearing blue robes. "I told you we'd find you again, Susumu," Vinny said, approaching the person.

When they turned around, however, they revealed that they weren't Susumu at all. In fact, it was actually Sachio, and his face had been stolen!

Not only was Sachio there, but Samuel and Bowyetta were there with him, and their faces were missing too. Priff approached the three carefully, tilting her head. "It's okay," she said. "We're here to help you. Take us to where your faces are."

Meanwhile, however, Susumu and Raya weren't doing as well as the others. "Urgh..." Susumu groaned. "How much farther is this cave anyway?"

"It can't be that much farther!" Raya tried to assure her. "Come on, let's just go find everyone so we can-"

And that was when Martcha suddenly let out a yelp. "S-Sorry!" she apologized. "I just... I-I thought I heard something! It sounded... Like a growling noise, and..."

What she didn't realize, however, was that a cerberus was standing right behind her, preparing to attack. "Martcha!" Susumu warned her, swinging her microphone at the cerberus's face. "T-that thing almost swallowed you up!"

"Hey, that thing's got faces on it too!" Raya pointed out. "That... Looks like Bowyetta?! But... Who else is there?"

Susumu, on the other hand, recognized the other two faces all too well. "Sachio! Oh, Samuel..."

Martcha twirled her staff around, firing a beam at the cerberus. "Susumu! We have to be strong! We can save them, I just know it!"

Susumu, however, wasn't entirely sure about that. Martcha was strong and Raya was strong, but she was just a girl. Not only that, but their party was split up as well. "How are we going to fight this thing...?"

The group continued fighting, slowly chipping away at the cerberus. It was hard to tell if they were doing any real damage or not, especially when the thing was able to hit ALL of them at once. "Gah..." Susumu slumped onto the ground. She was trying her hardest, but... This thing could hit pretty hard, and it was starting to hurt a lot...

"Kukukuku~" It was about this time, however, that Priff, Vinny, and the others had caught up to the group. Priff had noticed that Susumu wasn't looking so good, and decided to take it upon herself to give her some motivation. She carefully snuck up behind Susumu, and gave her a quick jab in the back with her fork-

"Aiiee!" Susumu jumped up as she suddenly felt something jab her. "Wha-?! Who-?!" She suddenly started smiling when she saw what had jabbed her. "Priff! Vinny! You're okay! And... You found them?"

"Hey, why are these guys?" Raya asked, staring at the faceless bunch, not realizing that he was about to take another attack.

Martcha quickly protected him by firing another beam at the cerberus. "We can discuss it later," she replied. "Right now, we have to save these three's faces!"

Susumu nodded, and swung her microphone at the cerberus again. Now that they were all back together, things felt a lot easier than before! The thing was still pretty strong, but with five people fighting together, it went down a lot easier than before.

"Three faces in one!" Raya exclaimed, his tail thumping against his armor. "Now let's see who-"

"Uwah!" Raya was interrupted when he was suddenly jumped by Samuel. "I-I was... You... You saved us!"

"Sachio!" Susumu quickly scooped Sachio into a hug, tears filling her eyes. "I-I was so worried about you... Are you okay?"

"Susumu..." Sachio sobbed. "I-I'm not hurt, but... I-it was really scary! Azamir just dumped us in this lava cave, and then he took our faces and stuck it on that thing... I-I don't even know where I am!"

Martcha landed on Sachio's shoulder to comfort him. "It's alright, you're all safe now," she said quietly. "Bowyetta? Are you okay?"

Bowyetta, however, seemed to be the only one who wasn't terrified. In fact, she just seemed more confused than anything. "...Huh?" she finally responded. "Um... Is nothing. Bowyetta... Is just not being certain what have happened."

"It doesn't matter now, Bowyetta," Susumu groaned. "I'm... Starting to get tired again..."

Samuel started to look a bit worried. "Um, Susumu?" he asked. "I think I saw an inn up ahead. If you need to rest, you should..."

Raya's eyes widened again. "Another inn? Inside a cave?"

"At this point, I'm surprised that you're surprised by anything anymore," Priff said.

"Well, whatever," Susumu sighed. "Let's just move on. We've... Still got to find a few more people before we can go after Azamir."

Of course, Susumu knew she wouldn't be completely calm until everyone was safe...


	26. Act 4, Scene 4: Standing Together

The rest of the walk to Azamir's castle was spent on introductions. The walk was filled with laughter, talking, and shouting, and everyone seemed to be getting along just fine. The only person who wasn't laughing, however, was Susumu. She tried to be cheerful and join in with the others, but she couldn't shake the feeling that something horrible had happened to her friends.

Eventually, however, she decided that she should say SOMETHING, at least. "...Hey, Martcha?" She asked. "...You're stronger than the Dark Lord, aren't you?"

Martcha smiled slightly at the question. "Well, Susumu... As I have said before, I am a god, and... That Dark Lord... I'm not sure what he is... But, yes, I can confidently say that I am stronger than he is."

Raya gave her an odd look. "If you're so much stronger, then why not just go take him out yourself?" he questioned.

Martcha looked down at that. "Well, you see, Raya," she began. "As a divine being, I am not allowed to interfere with destiny. The will of other beings must be carried out on their own, after all."

"Destiny..." Susumu mumbled. She wasn't sure what Martcha meant by that. Was she saying... That it was her destiny to defeat the Dark Lord? To save all of Miitopia? ...To become a hero...?

While Susumu was pondering this, she didn't even notice that the group was walking right into the Dark Lord's castle. Or that she ended up wandering too far away from the others. Or that something was looming behind her, preparing to hit her in the-

"GAH!" Susumu was suddenly slammed in the face by... Something REALLY heavy. She didn't quite know what was happening, but her head was hurting a lot now. When Susumu looked up, she was terrified at what she saw. It looked like those Fire Demons they had fought before, except this one was MUCH larger. And what's more, it had Neal's face attached to it.

"Neal!" she called out. "Oh no, where are you?!" Something wasn't right here. This thing had Neal's face, but Neal was nowhere to be found. What... Did it do to him? Was this thing... Going to kill her too?

"Hey, Susumu!" Suddenly, Susumu was scooped out of the way. "Are you alright? That thing almost made you into Susumu dust!"

Susumu looked up to see that the group had caught up with her, and she was being carried away by Raya. "Raya! I-it's Neal! He's..."

"We know, he had his face taken," Raya replied. "But don't worry! Look, everyone's fighting to get it back!"

Seeing her friends fight, however, only made Susumu more terrified for their lives. "G-Guys, wait!" She called out to them. "That thing... I-I think it..."

Meanwhile, Susumu's friends were having a hard time taking down the Neal Demon. "What... What is this thing?!" Samuel squeaked. "Why is it so strong?!"

At this point, Priff was starting to realize what was going on. "Ku... It's Susumu," she said. Everyone gave her an odd look, until she explained herself. "This thing is absorbing Susumu's fear. Her terror is actually making it stronger. If we can get her to calm down, we can defeat it."

"But what we age to be doing?" Bowyetta asked. "Miss Susumu is thinking that Neal is being dead!"

"I'm sure Samuel has something that can help~"

"Something... That can help..." Samuel looked at his staff for a moment, then at Susumu, who was now on the ground sobbing and clinging to Raya. "Um... I'm sorry to have to do this to you, Susumu, but..." He then cast a gentle blue light upon Susumu.

Susumu couldn't place why, but the blue light was making her feel... A lot calmer somehow. "S-Samuel? I... Think I can..." Slowly and carefully, she started to stand up.

Raya immediately hit the Neal Demon as hard as he could. As it turned out, Priff was right! "Hey! This thing's a lot weaker now!" he declared.

"Kukuku... I told you so~" Priff said, delivering one last hit to the demon. "Susumu? Care to do the honors?"

Susumu gave a half-hearted hit to finish off the demon. Priff was surprised to see that Susumu still wasn't happy about this, however. "Well, there goes his face," she sighed. "But... What does that matter when-"

"KYAAAAH!" Suddenly, a shout rang out through the castle. "Alright, where is he?!" Out of the darkness came a very familiar looking figure. A figure that looked like-

"Neal!" Susumu suddenly pounced on Neal, her eyes filling with tears. "Thank Garaden you're okay, I... I thought that thing killed you!"

Neal pulled away in surprise. "Wha- Hey!" he exclaimed. "It's alright. I've told ya before, nothing can kill me! But... Where did that Dark Lord get to?! He dumped me here and took my face to put on that... Thing!"

"It's alright, Neal," Susumu said. "We're going after the Dark Lord now, actually. But... There's still someone we need to find first."

"Someone we need to find?" Samuel asked? But don't we have everyone all together?"

"Not quite yet," Raya replied. "We still gotta get Konade."

"Who's Konade?" Sachio asked. "I thought we were looking for Yardi!"

"Er... I'll explain on the way," Susumu said. "Neal, did you see anything before your face got stolen?"

"Uh, yeah!" Neal answered. "There was a pink haired girl, and some angry-looking guy... I think I saw them in the next room, actually!"

"Pink hair and angry eyes?" Susumu nodded. "Yeah, that sounds about right... Come on, guys. Let's just hope they're okay..."


	27. Act 4, Scene 5: A Heartful Reunion

"So, let me get this striaght," Raya began. "You're saying that before you met me, you met all these other people too?"

"Yeah," Susumu answered.

"And Azamir kidnapped all of us and tried to erase your memory because you were trying to stop him?" Vinny continued.

"Yeah," Susumu repeated, a bit impatiently.

"And now we're all working together to stop him!" Neal finished!

"Yeah... Yeah, I guess we are!" Susumu declared.

Suddenly, Martcha spoke up. "Excuse me... But, did you say that the Dark Lord's name is Azamir?"

"Yeah, it is," Priff answered. "Why? You know him or something?"

"Well, I do know someone named Azamir," Martcha explained. "He's... Something of an annoyance to me, but... He would never do anything like this. Something must be wrong, but... What is it?"

Susumu looked around to see if she saw anyone that looked familiar, when something caught her eye. "...Hey!" she exclaimed. "Check out this painting!"

Sachio followed her over, and his eyes lit up at what he saw. The two were staring at a painting of none other than the Dark Lord himself. "Oh wow!" Sachio chirped. "I wonder... Did Azamir paint this?"

"I don't know, but they actually managed to make Azamir look cute!" Susumu answered. She took a step back to admire the painting more. The detail was remarkable, right down to every hair on the Dark Lord's head. The colors were vibrant, and the lighting was in the perfect place to give off a menacing vibe.

The painting's face looked exactly like Konade.

The two didn't notice it at first, but... That was why the face looked so cute. The painting had Konade's face stuck to it. "...KONADE!"

Susumu and Sachio turned around to find Konade and Yardi standing right behind them. "Yardi!" Susumu quicky pounced on him, scooping him into a hug. Yardi, however, didn't seem too happy about this, and quickly pushed her away. "Y-Yardi... What... Happened to your face?"

Yardi motioned toward the rest of the group, who seemed to be fighting what looked like a haunted suit of armor with his face attached. "Hang on, Yardi! I'm gonna save you!" Susumu started to take off for the rest of the group, only to be stopped by Sachio.

"Susumu, wait! We gotta save Konade!"

"But... Yardi's..." Tears started to fill Susumu's eyes. Yeah, she wanted to save Konade, but... Yardi meant a lot to her.

Yardi, meanwhile, happened to notice this. Susumu... Was that worried about him? Even without a face at all, his face was quite clearly turning red. Though he couldn't talk right now, he put his hand on Susumu's shoulder, as though he were trying to assure her.

"Yardi?" she looked up. "You... Want me to save Konade?"

Yardi nodded in response. He did appreciate how she felt, but the others were doing just fine saving him. In fact, it looked like they were almost done.

Susumu nodded, and stood up, turning back to Sachio. "Sachio! Let's save Konade!" she declared, swinging her microphone at the painting. Sachio jumped up, hurling a fireball from his wand.

The painting, however, was a lot stronger than either of them expected. Not only that, but it was capable of hitting both of them at once. Sachio slumped to the ground. "I can't handle much more of this..."

"H-Hey! Sachio!" Susumu tried to shake him to his feet. "Come on, we're almost done! Just a little more, then we can..." But the truth was, Susumu didn't feel like she could handle much more either. The painting reared up to attack her once more. "T-this is it..."

"Hey! Don't give up now!" Before Susumu realized what was happening, Yardi jumped in front of her, taking the hit in her place. He brushed it off like it was nothing, and delivered the final hit on the painting himself.

"Yardi! Konade!" Susumu pounced on them. "Thank Garaden you two are okay! I... I thought I was never going to see you again!"

Konade was startled by the sudden pounce. "Ah! Susumu!" Konade exclaimed, returning the hug. "I knew you would come for us! But... What about you? Are you okay?"

"I'm feeling a lot better now that I know everyone is safe..." Susumu admitted. "I... I was so scared I'd never see you all again..."

"Hey, we're all back together, aren't we?" Vinny remarked.

Yardi's face was about the same color as Susumu's hair. "Susumu... You.. Were worried about me?"

"Of course I was, Yardi!" she answered, giving him another hug. "You're my friend after all!"

After a moment, Bowyetta finally spoke up again. "Um... Please to be excusing of Bowyetta, but... Should we not be going after the Dark Lord now?"

"Oh, yes!" Samuel added. "Now that there's more of us, we should have no trouble beating him now! ...Right?"

Konade, however, carefully nudged Sachio awake, helping him up off the ground. "If you don't mind, it's getting late, and I think we should get some rest for the night." she said. "This whole trip has been especially hard on Susumu..."

"Hey, yeah! I think I saw an inn up ahead anyway!" Yardi added.

"These inns are very conveniently placed, aren't they?" Raya pointed out.

"Well, at any rate... I think I'd like to join you all, if you don't mind," Martcha said.

"You're... Coming with us?" Susumu was confused. "But... I thought you couldn't fight Azamir yourself."

"Well, no, I can't," Martcha began. "But, I would like to keep an eye on you, either way. In case... Something goes wrong. I'm very worried about you all." Her expression suddenly turned to concern.

"Hey, are we just gonna sit here or what?" Neal said. "Let's get some sleep so we can go take out that Dark Lord!" With that he dashed off towards the next inn.

"He doesn't sit still, does he?" Konade sighed.

"Not at all," Susumu answered. "Now, let's get going, everyone! In 17 hours, we fight the Dark Lord!"

Ooh, I've always wanted to say something like that...


	28. Act 4, S 6: Showdown With The Dark Lord

Dinner that night was a noisy commotion of voices, laughter, and shouting. Susumu was feeling like herself again, and the group seemed to be getting along just fine.

At that moment, Raya stood up. "Hey, hey everyone!" He called, trying to get the group's attention. "I know things haven't been so good for us lately. But that's okay, and ya know why? Tomorrow, we're gonna show that Azamir what's what once and for all!"

"This could probably be really dangerous..." Konade remarked. "Maybe we shouldn't all go at once. Maybe only a few of us should go?"

"Why would we do that?" Neal asked. "If we all go, we'll be able to take out the Dark Lord faster!"

Bowyetta shook her head. "Is being true that we will being much stronger together, but what if something is happening? Should some of us not be staying behind?"

"No, Bowyetta's right," Susumu agreed. "I shouldn't go up there alone, but... It'd be too dangerous if we all went down there. We should go in a small group."

"So, who are you gonna bring with you?" Sachio asked.

Susumu thought about it for a second. "...Raya! You're a heavy hitter. You'll be able to do a lot of damage real fast! And, Samuel, we'll need your healing to help us with this. And... Sachio! Maybe your magic could help us?"

"Alright!" Raya declared, his tail wagging. "I'm gonna do my best!"

"Susumu wants me to help too?" Samuel asked, looking worried.

"Whoo-hoo!" Sachio was excited. "I can't believe it! I'm gonna get to fight the Dark Lord!"

The rest of dinner passed without much incident, and the inn was loud and bustling for the rest of the night. The next morning, the designated group prepared to set off for the Dark Lord's chambers, with the others there to send them off.

"Good luck, everyone!" Konade said.

"You must be defeating of the Dark Lord!"

Susumu smiled at the group. "Thank you, everyone! We'll do our best, we promise!" She turned back to the others. "Right, everyone. Are you ready?"

"I-I guess I am..."  
"Yeah, let's get goin' already!"  
"I'm gonna fight the Dark Lord! I'm gonna fight the Dark Lord!"

Susumu nodded, and the group set off once and for all. This is it. Finally, we're going to settle things. Finally, we're going to take care of the Dark Lord, save everyone's faces, and...

"Ahahaha... So you did come here after all."

"Ugh, seriously? During my monologue again? That's..."

Before Susumu could finish, however, The Dark Lord himself appeared before the group. "Well, well, if it isn't the little hero again. I'm impressed you actually survived long enough to make it here."

"Hey, Azamir!" Susumu shouted. "Knock it off with the face stealing, would ya?!"

Sachio stepped up. "We're here to stop you once and for all!"

"You and your neck ruffle don't scare us!" Raya declared.

"Ahahahaha. That is adorable," Azamir mocked, sniffing at the group slightly. "And to think all of you showed up just to visit little ol' me. You really are too precious. It's a shame that I'll have to dispose of you so soon."

"We'll just see about that!" Susumu declared, swinging her microphone.

And so the battle began. The party kept to their usual positions: Samuel in the back for healing, Raya attacking in the front, and Susumu and Sachio in the middle providing magical support. Azamir attacked the party several times, but as it turned out, he wasn't nearly as strong as they expected.

"Man, is that all you can do?" Raya huffed. "For the so-called Dark Lord you sure hit like a Peach Jelly!"

"Hm. It seems I will have to try something else." Azamir gave a slight wave of his hand, and began to summon something.

"W-what is he-" And at that moment Samuel froze. Azamir was... Summoning a pair of imps?! But he wasn't done there. Azamir then opened his eyes, and Susumu and Sachio's faces began to come off, before being stuck onto the imps.

Samuel's eyes got even wider than usual. "H-How are we supposed to tell them apart?!"

"...Samuel!" Raya exclaimed. "You get Susumu and Sachio back! I'LL take care of Azamir." It was time for Raya to try something he didn't do very often. With a single, quick motion, he tossed his cannon aside, then very slowly and carefully began to step out of his armor. Sparkles and rose petals flew in the air around him, and his ears bounced around majestically. Samuel, Azamir, and even Susumu and Sachio stared at him in silent shock.

"Ha!" Now that Raya had his armor off, he was able to move much more freely, and deliver a series of fast hits to Azamir. "I've got this, Samuel! Just save those two!"

While Raya was fighting the Dark Lord on his own, Samuel took a look at his faceless friends, then at the two imps. "Um... D-don't worry, Sachio! I'll get your face back!" Samuel declared. As he attack the imp holding Susumu's face. Sachio quickly shook his head, and pointed at the other imp. "Umm..."

Susumu and Sachio waved their arms frantically, which only seemed to upset Samuel even more. "I-I can't tell who is who!" He kept swinging his staff at the imps, but both of them were a lot stronger than he expected. Raya seemed to be doing just fine on his own, but Samuel wasn't having a whole lot of luck. "Uhhh... Uhhhhhh..." Samuel's staff began to give off light. "WAAAHHH!" Without even thinking, he swung his staff at the imps, and managed to save Susumu and Sachio's faces.

"Wah! Samuel! We're back!" The two said in unison, hugging each other.

"Uh, everyone! Help here!" Raya called out. He was fast, but he couldn't keep running like this for much longer.

"Susumu! You ready to finish this together?" Sachio asked.

Susumu nodded, and the two prepared to launch a finishing attack on the Dark Lord.  
"On three, everyone!" Susumu declared. "One..."  
Raya put his cannon back on his head.  
"...Two..."  
Samuel twirled his staff in preparation.  
"...THREE!"  
The group launched one final attack on the Dark Lord, hitting him squarely in his chest. "Nng!"

And it was finally over.


	29. A 4 S 7: Showdown With The Dark Lord 2

"Urgh..." The Dark Lord's body had disappeared entirely, and standing in his place was a man in a blue outfit, with oddly green hair. "W-what... Happened to me? I'm... Feeling kind of dizzy..." The man stood up carefully and took a look around, before he walked away.

Susumu turned back to her team. "We did it, everyone! We beat the Dark Lord!" The group quickly descended into a mass of cheering, hugging and laughing.

"Oh! Well done, everyone!" A familiar, squeaky voice rang out, as a tiny, familiar figure approached.

"Martcha!" Susumu exclaimed. "I'm so glad you're okay!"

"Well, of course I am!" Martcha said with a bow. "...Susumu. All of Miitopia is indebted to you. Thanks to you everyone's faces have been saved, and the world can live in peace from now-"

As she was speaking, however, something was happening behind her. Some sort of strange, purple blob rose up from the ground and into the air. Samuel let out a scream as he pointed at the blob.

"Eh?!" Martcha looked up, seeing the purple blob floating above her. The blob turned around to reveal that it also had a single eye, one that reminded Samuel of what had happened to Susumu before. The shadowy blob looked around, before laying its eye on Susumu. Looking up at the blob, she froze in place before it jumped at her.

"Susumu!" Martcha squeaked. "That thing is-!" Martcha suddenly jumped in front of Susumu, taking the hit in her place.

"Ohhhh no!" Martcha struggled against the shadowy blob for a moment, until it eventually dragged her to the ground.

"Martcha!" Susumu was about to dash over to save her, but was quickly held back by Samuel. She could only watch what was happening.

Martcha sat up, coughing as a strange purple substance started to run down her face. "Susumu... You've... Got to..." She didn't get to finish her sentence before she was dragged back into darkness.

"M-Martcha..." Susumu's eyes started to fill up with tears. The Great Sage herself... The one who had brought Susumu this far... Was-

Suddenly, the shadow began to react. A small, almost dog-like shape rose from the shadow. The darkness quickly cleared away to reveal... Martcha? It looked like her, but... Something was wrong. Suddenly, it started speaking in that high-pitched voice of hers. "I... I have the Great Sage's power!"

"Martcha...?" Susumu and Sachio tilted their heads in confusion. Samuel hung back in terror, but Raya couldn't hold back his laughter. "Aww, just look at her!" he chirped. "She's all purple and stuff now!"

"Raya... I... I don't think that's Martcha!" Samuel squeaked.

The tiny dog-like figure hovered above the group. "Oh, I'm afraid your little healer friend is right," she said. "Actually, he's... Sort of right. I'm certain not your so-called Great Sage. But... My Garaden, do I FEEL like a god now!" She looked at once of her tiny, detached paws. "Ah... So much power in this one... Of course, it was hard to get into her heart... But now that I've done it... Just thing of what I'm going to do to Miitopia now! And yet... Somehow, I feel... Even STRONGER than a Dark Lord. I am... Ultra Dark Lord Martcha!"

And that was where Raya absolutely lost it. "W-what?" He gasped in between fits of laughter. "Just look at her! Acting all evil and stuff... It's hilarious!"

Raya quickly stopped laughing as soon as Martcha fired a beam from her staff right above his head. "Well, now, you little heroes, I bid you all farewell! Kyahyahyahya!" And with that, the Ultra Dark Lord disappeared into the darkness.

"M-Martcha... She just saved me..." Susumu sobbed.

"Then we've gotta go save her!" Raya declared. "Come on, let's-"

But he was stopped by Susumu. "How are we supposed to do that?!" she demanded. "She's a GOD, Raya! She's more powerful than anything we've ever faced!"

"Yeah, but did you see how we took down that Dark Lord?!" Raya reminded her. "If we can take him down, we can certainly take her down!"

"But... We don't even know where to start," Samuel said.

"We might not," Sachio began. "But I have a friend who might have seen her around. He's... A bit odd, but maybe he can help us! We'll just have to go and find him."

"We're with you all the way, Sachio," Susumu said. "Let's go find your friend and save Martcha!"

...But will the bad guys let her do it?

END OF ACT 4


	30. Act 5, Scene 1: Junpei-ing The Price

Sachio led the group to what seemed to be a small town. Taking a look around, Samuel thought the whole place looked... A little shady. "Sachio, are you sure this is safe?" he asked. "This place looks sketchy to me..."

Sachio gave him a pat on the shoulder. "Don't worry, Samuel! I come here all the time. A lot of people come through this place every day, but... My friend is always around here somewhere... Ah! Look, there he is!"

Sachio led the group over to someone who was waving at him: A tall man wearing a long blue coat, with black hair and oval-shaped eyes. Susumu was a bit surprised at what she saw. This guy looked almost exactly like Priff!

"Sachio, hello!" The man greeted them, before quickly turning to Susumu. "Oh! You never told me you had a twin sister! The name's Junpei. Junpei Mitidori! Good to meet ya!"

"Junpei, have you seen anything... Unusual around here?" Sachio asked. "Maybe a tiny purple dog-thing flying around?"

Junpei stopped to think for a moment. "Yes... Yes, I've seen her," he responded. "I saw her take off into the sky somewhere. Wonder if she lives in that old Sky Scraper..."

"Sky Scraper?" Susumu repeated. "Junpei, we've gotta get up there! But... How are we gonna get to the sky?"

"Not to worry, not to worry!" Junpei assured her. "I just so happen to have a device that can take all five of us straight to the sky!"

"Oh yeah, Susumu!" Sachio spoke up. "Junpei's a scientist. He's good at inventing all kinda of things! ...I think."

Junpei led the group over to his flying machine. It... Somewhat resembled a helicopter, only somewhat rickity. "Are you sure this is safe?" Samuel asked.

"Of course it's safe!" Junpei answered. "I fly around in this thing all the time! Just hop in and let me do the driving. There's, uh, something we need to do first. Before we can get into the Sky Scraper we'll need to gather up a few things."

The group climbed into the helicopter-thing, and Junpei took them all up into the sky. "Before we can go into the Sky Scraper, we'll have to make a quick stop first. There's a lock on the door that you'll need a set of jewels to open. Luckily, I just so happen to know where one of those jewels is!"

"Jewels?" Susumu asked. "Didn't we already do this in Neksdor?"

Junpei shrugged. "I'm just following the script. Anyway, it looks like we're here."

Susumu looked out the window, and she couldn't believe what she was seeing! Junpei had taken them far above the clouds, but it looked like they were in some sort of futuristic city!

"...And here we are!" Junpei declared, as he carefully landed his contraption just outside some sort of square building. "The jewel we'll need is just inside this lab. Stay close to me and we'll find it in no time, okay?"

The group stepped inside the strange cubicle building, and Susumu took a look around. Raya wrinkled his nose. "Uh... It smells... Medical in here."

Junpei looked confused for a moment. "...Oh!" his eyebrows shot up when he realized what Raya meant. "Yeah. The workers here use all kinds of chemicals and stuff to keep this place really clean. They say that even the slightest bit of dirt could mess up the equipment in here."

Samuel tilted his head. "Is that really safe?"

"Kyahya... Kyahyahya..." Was all Junpei responded with. "Anyway, the jewel is kept in one of these rooms. I'll lead you to it if you want."

Junpei led the group down one hallway after another, but Susumu didn't feel like they were making any progress at all. Every hallway and door looked exactly the same to her, and she was starting to doubt if Junpei really knew what he was doing. Eventually, however, Junpei stopped in front of one of the doors. "Okay, here we are!" he announced. "The jewel is just behind this door!"

"Are you sure this is the right door?" Samuel asked. "It looks just the same as all the others."

Junpei nodded. "Don't worry! I just gotta enter the access code..." He then turned around and typed up something on a small keypad in front of the door, only to be greeted with a buzzing sound. "Oh. I, uh, may have entered the wrong code."

"Well, can't you try again?" Raya asked.

"Don't these places usually have some sort of security system?" Sachio asked.

At that moment, a slamming sound could be heard just down the hallway, and suddenly all the lights in the hall turned red. "W-what happened?!" Raya demanded. A metal door could now be seen blocking the end of the hall, as well as the door to the room they were trying to get into.

"Yeah. Kinda expected this," Sachio sighed.

"Look!" Samuel pointed down the hallway, where a large robot with a single wheel could be seen coming toward the group.

"Junpei, keep trying to remember that code!" Raya instructed. "We gotta take this thing down before it takes US down!"

Junpei, however, stopped to produce some sort of tube from his coat. "Ahem. If I may," he said, before pouring the contents of the tube onto the group's weapons, causing them to catch fire. Samuel, of course, refused when it was his turn, however.

"Aw, cool!" Sachio chirped, before swinging his wand at the robot.

Fighting with the fiery weapons seemed to make things a lot easier. Susumu swung her microphone at the robot, and doing so released a burst of flame that dealt it even more damage! However, a screen suddenly popped up in front of the robot, and some sort of target mark appeared around Susumu's feet.

"Eh?" Before Susumu could realize what was going on, however, the robot fired a laser directly at her. And it... Really hurt. Like, a lot. "GUH!" Susumu toppled over backwards, feeling like her entire body was on fire.

"Are you okay?" Samuel asked, raising his staff to heal Susumu.

Susumu was so stunned she was having a bit of trouble speaking. "Urgh... The... Robot... I think it shrunk..."

Sachio and Raya looked up to see that she was right. Firing that laser must have taken a lot of energy. The robot had folded up into itself, and was now much smaller!

"Aww, it's so cute!" Sachio gushed.

"Hey! That thing just cooked up a serving of roasted Susumu, remember?" Raya reminded him. "If we don't finish that thing, it'll cook us too!"

"Ew... Let's... Just get rid of this thing. Samuel's taking care of Susumu."

The party was down two members, but in this state, the robot was a lot weaker than before. A few more bursts from Raya's cannon, and it was down for the count.

"...Aha!" Junpei suddenly declared. "Got it! Okay, that code should've disabled the security system. Now, I'm gonna open the door for real!" As the light in the room returned to normal and the door blocking the hallway opened, Junpei typed in another code, and sure enough, the door opened.

"You did it!" Raya declared. "Now let's get in there so-"

"Ah. Sorry, I can't let you in," Junpei stopped him. "This room is employees only. I'll go get the jewel for you." He disappeared into the room for a second, before returning with a large green jewel that seemed to be shaped like an eye.

"Ooh, that's creepy..." Susumu shuddered.

"This jewel is just one of the items you'll need to get into the Sky Scraper," Junpei explained. "You'll still need to find the other two, of course."

"Do you know where it is?" Samuel asked.

"Yeah, you wouldn't happen to have those other two jewels on you, would you?" Raya added.

Junpei shook his head. "Sorry, this is the only one I've got. But, if there's anything else you need I'm glad to help."

"Well, your flying machine could be useful," Susumu said. "Think you're up to flying us around?"

Junpei jumped up at the sound of that. "You want to take a ride in my flying machine? No problem! Just say the word and we'll take to the skies faster than... Something that takes to the skies, Kyahyahyahya!"

"I think first we should head back to the Traveler's Hub," Samuel suggested. "There might be more people there who can help us."

"That isn't a bad idea, Samuel," Sachio said.

"Um, can we get out of here?" Susumu asked. "This smell is starting to hurt my eyes and nose..."

"Er, right," Junpei asked. "We should head back to the Traveler's Hub as soon as possible. I can hold onto the jewels for you if you want. That way you won't lose them."

"Sounds good to me, Junpei," Susumu said. "Next stop, Traveler's Hub!"

As the group climbed back into Junpei's contraption, Susumu looked up, even further into the sky. "The Sky Scraper... I wonder what Ultra Dark Lord Martcha is up to up there...?"


	31. Act 5, Scene 2: Cold As Ice

Susumu decided to bring a new party with her to the Traveler's Hub this time. She walked down the street alongside Konade, Neal, and Vinny, chattering the entire way.

However, Susumu looked a bit nervous about this whole thing. "Susumu? Is everything okay?" Konade asked.

"...Eh?" Susumu looked up at Konade. "Oh, everything's... Everything's fine. I was just... Just thinking, that's all."

Thinking about how weak she was, and how powerful Martcha was. Thinking about what was going to happen if they tried to challenge her. Thinking about how easily Martcha could kill her-

She didn't even notice when something grabbed her. "GAAAH! What are you doing?! W-who are you?! Put me down right now!"

"Susumu?! Susumu, what's going on?!" Neal demanded. Before he got a response, however, he saw something fly up into the air, carrying Susumu with it.

"W-what is that thing?" Konade screeched. "Where is it taking Susumu?!"

Junpei came running up to the group. "Oh! It's terrible!" he exclaimed. "You're Susumu's friends, aren't you? Something just grabbed Susumu and carried her away!"

"We know," Neal replied. "But where did that thing even go? We've gotta go save her!"

Junpei pointed off into the distance. "I saw it take off toward Powdered Peaks," he answered. "I can fly us up there, but... I have to warn you. That place is cold. Like, seriously. REALLY cold."

"No problem, no problem!" Neal declared. "The cold doesn't bother me at all!" ...But then he remembered what Susumu told him. "Ack! Susumu! She... Doesn't do well in the cold at all!"

"That just means we should save her faster then," Vinny said. "She rescued us back in Karkaton. Now it's our turn to return the favor."

The group wasted no time in hopping back into Junpei's helicopter. "Take us to Powdered Peaks as fast as you can, Junpei!" Neal instructed. "Susumu isn't gonna hold out for too long in that place!"

It didn't take long for the group to reach Powdered Peaks. As Junpei set the helicopter down onto the snow, he turned back to the party. "I, uh... Think I'm gonna sit this one out," he said. "I... Don't do so well in the cold myself. Besides, I've got to stay behind and watch my helicopter."

Neal hopped out of the helicopter as soon as he opened the door. Konade carefully touched down and stepped out. Vinny, however, was far shorter than the others, and had a bit of trouble getting out of the helicopter on his own. "...Hey, give me a break. I'm just a dog after all," he said.

The group tried to scan the landscape, but the snow was coming down too hard for them to see much of anything. "I don't see Susumu anywhere," Konade remarked. "At least, I don't think so..."

"We're going to have to go looking for her, aren't we?" Vinny asked.

"We are," Neal replied. "Anyway, this place can't be all that big, right?"

Once the group set off, however, they began to realize that this place was much bigger than they had expected. ...And much colder, too. Not only that, but the further in they went, the harder the snow started to fall. Eventually, the group had completely lost sight of where they were.

"Urgh..." Konade's petals were beginning to droop. Being a flower, the cold was pretty bad for her. She knew she had to stick things out for Susumu, but even so this was starting to hurt. "I-I have to..." And then she slumped over into the snow.

"Wha-?!" Neal rushed over to her. "Hey! Konade! Are you alright?" he asked. "Come on, you've gotta get up!" He gave her a few shakes, but she still didn't get up. Looking around, Neal could see a small cave not far away. "Vinny, come help me!" He then proceeded to attempt to pick up Konade. It was a bit of a struggle, since they were both so small, but eventually they managed to pick her up and carry her into the cave.

Once they were inside the cave, Neal and Vinny put Konade down, and Neal took a closer look at her. "Neal... Thank you," Konade said. "I-I'm so sorry, I know we have to find Susumu... I should've told you I would freeze out there, and..."

"Hang on, I'm not done yet," Neal informed her. With that, he removed his claws and began rubbing his hands together. It took him a minute or so, but... He was starting to generate heat between his hands! Before long, Konade was feeling warmed up again.

While this was going on, Vinny took a minute to look around the cave, when something on the ground caught his eye. As he walked over and picked it up, Neal followed him. "What you got th-"

His eyes widened when he saw that Vinny was holding a pair of purplish-pink colored glasses: The same ones that Susumu always wore. "These are Susumu's, aren't they?" Vinny asked. "She must be in this cave somewhere."

"Then we're getting close!" Neal declared. "Konade, you wait for us here! We think Susumu might be in this cave. We just have to go find her!"

Before Konade could say something, Neal took off into the cave, with Vinny close behind. "Where do you think she might be?" Neal asked.

Vinny continued walking, until he ended up bumping into something. "Um. Ow." Looking up, he seemed to have bumped into some sort of ice statue. The detail on this thing was incredible! "Oh, hey, look at this. I wonder who made this. It looks exactly like Susumu." Without thinking, he reached up and put the glasses on the statue's face.

...And that was when Neal noticed what had happened. "...This IS Susumu!" he exclaimed. "Vinny, she's been frozen solid! What are we gonna do?!"

"Hey, you're the fiery one," Vinny said. "Do what you did for Konade."

Neal looked a bit uncertain at first, but then he nodded, and began rubbing his hands together in front of Susumu. Slowly but surely, the ice around her began to melt. "Hey! It's working!" Neal declared. "Just a little bit longer, and I should have her..."

But then a strange noise began to echo throughout the cave. The noise didn't even SOUND like it was made by something human. "Looks like we'd better hurry," Vinny pointed out. "I think the thing that took Susumu is coming back."

"Ack!" Neal began rubbing his hands faster than before. Just a little bit more, and Susumu would be able to move again. "...I think I've got it!"

And sure enough, Susumu was completely thawed. "Urghh..." She was having a bit of trouble standing, but at least she was still alive. "...What's..."

"Wha- hey!" Neal grabbed her hand and started running. "It's me, Neal! We came to save you, but we can't stay here! We've gotta get out before that thing that ran off with you comes back!"

Neal stopped to grab Konade on the way out of the cave, and he dashed back towards the helicopter, helping the girls in as he did so. As ever, Vinny had some trouble climbing into the helicopter. "Come on, we gotta head out!" Neal exclaimed, picking up Vinny and helping him inside as he closed the door. "Junpei, get us outta here!"

As Junpei took the helicopter off the ground and away from Powdered Peaks, Neal clung to Susumu, trying to keep her warm. "Just hang in there, Susumu," he tried to comfort her. "We'll get you home as soon as we can, okay? Just... Please, say something..."

Susumu was quiet for a minute. "Neal... Everyone... Thank you..." She finally said. "I-I was so scared I would freeze to death in there, but then you all came back for me..."

"Of course we came back for you, Susumu," Konade said softly. "We're your friends. We care about you. And if anything were to happen to you..."

"It's just too bad we didn't get the next jewel," Vinny said.

Susumu, however, reached into her pocket, producing an orange jewel that looked just like the previous one. "I... Managed to pocket this off that monster before it froze me," she said. "I'm just so glad it didn't break when I was..."

Neal's eyes widened. "Whoa, seriously?! Maybe that's why it froze you! It must've been protecting that jewel!"

"Well, at least we have it now," Konade said. "But Susumu still needs her rest. Junpei, take us straight back to the inn. We can't set out again until Susumu is back on her feet."

Susumu said nothing, holding onto Neal as she stared out the window.

"...Thanks, everyone. I don't know what I would've done without you..."


	32. Act 5, Scene 3: Into A Mysterious Land

"Come ON! We've gotta go find that last jewel!"

As usual, Yardi was scolding Susumu, trying to get her up out of bed again. This time, however, instead of Susumu's usual sleepiness, something else was going on. "Look, you were wide awake just a minute ago!" Yardi continued. "Why won't you get up and get going?!"

"Mmph." Susumu buried herself further under the blankets. "Frozen blood. Need to warm up more."

"We thawed you out hours ago!" Yardi yelled. "You told us you were fine! So what's the deal?!"

Well, what else could she tell him? She certainly couldn't talk about how scared she was. How she worried that she was going to die. After a moment, she sat up and pulled the blanket off herself. "I... I'm still not feeling so well," she lied. "I just... Wanna rest today."

Yardi's expression softened as soon as he heard that. "O-Oh," he said. "Well, that's alright. Let's look for an easy job today, okay? Hopefully we can find that last jewel soon..."

Susumu set off back towards the Traveler's Hub, taking Yardi, Bowyetta, and Priff along with her. "Where you are thinking the last jewel is being?" Bowyetta asked.

Before anyone else could say anything, however, a small blue figure darted out of an alleyway. "Aiiee..." The strange figure very nearly ran into Susumu, until... It passed right through her! "Oh! I'm terribly sorry for that. I... Tend to not notice where I'm going..."

Susumu couldn't believe what she was seeing. "Aww, you're cute!" she squealed. "You're like... Some kinda lil' ghostie!"

The creature nodded. "Why, yes, I am a ghost!" she said. "How could you tell? Um... I was actually looking for someone who could help me... You see, I live in this great big house in the middle of the woods all on my own."

"That sounds absolutely horrible," Yardi said flatly.

"Oh, no, quite the opposite!" Ghostie answered. "It's actually more than enough for me, and I rather enjoy the quiet... Oh, but the thing is... Last night some really mean ghosts broke into my house and took the place over for themselves!" She then began crying. "I... I can't fight them myself, so I was looking for someone who could..."

Susumu tried to pat the little ghost on her shoulder, but her hand passed right through. "Er... Don't worry about it, Lil' Ghostie," she said. "We'll help you get your home back."

The ghost wiped her eyes. "You will?" she asked. "Oh, thank you so much! If you don't know where my house is, it's in a place called Peculia..."

"Peculia...?" Susumu was confused. "I've... Never heard of a place like that."

Bowyetta smiled as soon as she heard the name, however. "Bowyetta is knowing of where that place is being!" she declared. "Please to be following us back to our helicopter, Miss Ghost. We must be telling Mr. Junpei of where to be going!"

As the group made their way towards Peculia, Susumu sat near Junpei, staring out the window. "Susumu," Junpei spoke to her. "That Martcha person... She's your friend, isn't she?"

Susumu was startled by this. "...Yeah," she answered. "She's my friend. But... Lately, she... Hasn't been herself."

"Oh, well, that's okay," Junpei replied. "Sometimes people get that way. But as long as you're willing to stick by her through this, then everything will work out for both of you."

Susumu went silent for a minute. "...Oh! I think we're here!" Junpei exclaimed, as he prepared to land the helicopter.

Ghostie led the group out of the helicopter. "Oh! That's my house right over there!" She pointed to a rather creepy-looking mansion.

"Uhhh... That's really creepy," Yardi said.

"I know, isn't it great?" Ghostie gushed. "Um... Anyway. Those big mean ghosts are just inside. I would go fight them myself, but..." Tears started streaming down her face again. "I... I'm not strong enough to do this... B-But! It's okay, cause I've got someone to help me!"

The ghost led Susumu's party into the front room of her house. "Sheesh... This place is even creepier on the inside..." Susumu remarked. Ghostie, however, seemed perfectly happy in here.

"...The ghosts are further in," Priff said. "Let's go chase them off. Maybe I can help get rid of them without fighting, kukuku~"

"What... Does she mean by that?" Yardi asked.

"Um, actually..." Ghostie spoke up. "She's right. Those big mean ghosts... They're actually up in the attic. I can take you there, but... Please, be careful! They had weapons, and they tried to beat me up, and... Um... I-I'll take you up there."

Sure enough, once the group made their way up to the attic, Priff was there, and she was trying to talk to some sort of ghost-like creature. "...So, uh, yeah. You guys... Kinda barged into this little ghost's house here. So... Do you think you could maybe... You know, get out of here? ...Please? ...Kuku?"

The ghost, however, simply responded by smacking Priff down with its hammer. "Priff!" Susumu squeaked, running to her side. "Are you okay?"

Priff stood back up, producing her fork. "Kukuku... Seems like we'll have to fight things out~" she said, stabbing at one of the ghosts with her fork.

As the group prepared for battle, however, Bowyetta and Ghostie were uncertain about this whole thing. "Oh, wait!" Ghostie tried to stop them. "You can't fight those things! They're too strong!"

"We don't really have much of a choice!" Yardi shouted, dodging a hit from a hammer. "You want these things out of here, right?!"

The fight continued for some time, and eventually the group had managed to defeat all but one of the ghosts. This ghost, however, decided to try something different. Giving its hammer a twirl, it hit Susumu right in her face.

Susumu rubbed her eyes. "I... I'm alright!" she proclaimed. As she said this, however, her eyes were starting to fill up with tears. "Augh... I'll.. Be just fine!" She charged up to hit the ghost again, but... It was getting hard to see for all the tears in her eyes. She swung a few times, but all of them ended up missing.

The ghost reared up to attack Susumu again. Susumu couldn't see what was happening. As she was about to get hit, however, Bowyetta jumped in front of her. "Please to be stopping!" she exclaimed.

The others couldn't believe what they were seeing. Bowyetta... Was still trying to talk to the ghost?

"Please to not be hurting of us anymore!" Bowyetta continued. "We were only trying to be helping of this little ghost here!" She then motioned to Ghostie. "You are having kicked her out of her home, and... Is not being right! Please to be leaving of this place!"

The ghost stared at Ghostie for a second. The person they were terrorizing... Was one of their own kind? It had no idea that was what was going on. After a moment, the ghost dropped its hammer and flew away.

Susumu was finally able to wash all the tears out of her eyes. "B-Bowyetta... You did it!" She congratulated her friend. "You got rid of the last ghost!"

"Yeah, but you let that one get away," Yardi grumbled. "Was it really okay to do that?"

Ghostie approached the group. "Oh, thank you! Thank you so much!" she thanked them. "I... I thought I'd never get to see my home again... Oh, but! I can't just send you away without rewarding you!" She produced an odd, triangular red jewel from behind her back. "I don't have any money, but maybe you can sell this jewel for something?"

"This is one of the jewels we need to get into the Sky Scraper," Priff pointed out. "Let's get this back to the helicopter so Junpei can take us there. ...Hey, Ghostie? ...Thanks."

And with that, Ghostie led them all back to the exit and waved goodbye. "Thank you all again!" she called out. "I hope I'll get to see you again soon!" She started talking to herself once she was back inside her house. "It's been a while since I made these walls rattle... Ahem... Aiiiieeeeee..."


	33. Act 5, S 4: Road To The Ultra Dark Lord

"Well, here we are." Susumu looked up at the towering building in front of her. "Once we reach the top of this building... We'll be fighting Martcha."

"Well, what are you waiting for?!" Raya demanded. "Put the jewels in place so we can save our Great Sage!"

Susumu had no idea what she was feeling now. A mixture of terror, excitement, and a bit of sadness too. She knew she had to save Martcha, but... What if something happened? What if Martcha killed them all with a single hit?

"...Um...Susumu?" Samuel spoke up. "Are... You alright?"

"...Huh?" Susumu suddenly looked back at the door, realizing she hadn't put the jewels in place yet. "Oh... It's nothing. Let's... Let's go save Martcha." She put the jewels into their slots on the door, and the door slowly began to open.

The group wasted no time hurrying into the Sky Scraper. As soon as they entered, however, they were greeted by a familiar voice. "Kyahyahyahya! Well, look who decided to show up!"

Samuel jumped at the sound of the voice, but Susumu recognized it. "...Ultra Dark Lord Martcha!"

"That's right, you nosey little brats!" Martcha laughed. "You've meddled in my affairs for quite long enough. That ends now. If you really wish to challenge me, come to the top of the Sky Scraper. I'll be waiting- If you survive the trip that is! Kyahyahyahya!"

Raya was still trying to hold in his laughter. "Oh, come on!" he squeaked. "Just listen to how she talks! How can anyone take her seriously with that voice?"

"Will you actually focus on something for once?!" Yardi yelled at him. "We have to save Martcha! All of Miitopia is counting on us!" With that, he dashed up the stairs to the next floor.

On the next floor, the group looked around, searching for any signs of Martcha. All they found, however, was an oddly familiar voice. "Hm... Nowhere to be found..."

For some reason, the green-haired man from before was wandering around this floor of the Sky Scraper. "Oh, hey!" Susumu made her way over to him. "It's... Uh... It's you!"

"I know what you're going to say," the man sighed. "'It's you, Azamir, that one guy who used to be the Dark Lord'. That's... That's all anyone ever says to me anymore..."

"Uh, yeah, that!" Susumu exclaimed. "But... What are you doing up here? Isn't this place dangerous?"

"Well... How shall I even say this?" Azamir began. "This whole Dark Lord thing... Is all my fault. But, I never wanted any of this to happen! That's why... Why I'm going to redeem myself by defeating Martcha myself!"

"Wait- By yourself?!" Yardi demanded. "Are you crazy?! You're gonna get yourself killed!"

"W-wait, Azamir!" Susumu tried to stop him. "Yardi's right! You can't take her on on your own! Besides, we're going up to fight her ourselves!"

"You're... Going to fight her?" Azamir asked. "W-well... Please, take me with you at least! I want to make up for all the trouble I caused. If I don't... I fear that I may never be able to live with that. Besides, I... Don't actually have to worry about dying..."

The group looked at each other awkwardly. Well, what else could they say? "...Alright, we'll take you with us," Susumu answered.

"Thank you," was Azamir's response. "I promise, I will not let you down! Now, let's hurry to the next floor!"

And so, with Azamir following along, the group set off towards the top of the Sky Scraper. The walk was... Awkwardly silent, however. Susumu decided to speak up. "So... Azamir, what was it like being a Dark Lord?"

"Hmm?" Azamir looked at her. "Oh. About that... I actually don't remember much of it. That shadowy blob from before... It engulfed my body... Everything is just a blur after that. I remember bits and pieces, but..."

A few floors up, Susumu came across a pair of levers. "Hey, look!" She motioned for her group to follow. "I wonder what these levers do."

Raya tilted his head. "Well, only one way to find out!" he stated. He stepped up to one of the levers and pulled it. A clicking noise came from somewhere in the room, and an MP Candy dropped into Raya's hands. "Aw, cool!"

"Aww, I want an MP Candy too!" Susumu ran up to pull the other lever.

"Susumu, wait!" Samuel tried to stop her. "I think that lever is-"

Too late. A rumbling sound could be heard, and a rock dropped from the ceiling, knocking Susumu over. "Oww!"

"Oh no!" Azamir ran over to Susumu. "Susumu... You... Got hurt from that trap, didn't you? ...Hang on." He reached under his hat and produced... An HP Banana? "Here. Eat this."

"Uhh... Thanks?" Susumu said, taking the HP Banana. "But... Why did you just... Uh, you know... Have that?"

"Oh, I never told you?" Azamir smiled. "I'm a banana merchant! ...At least, I was..." His smiled faded quickly. "Before... That shadow overtook me. I'm trying to rebuild my business, but... No one can look at me the same way anymore..." He went silent for a few moments. "...We're getting close to the top. We've got to hurry."

The group continued climbing for what felt like hours. Somehow, it seemed to be getting colder the higher up they went, and the monsters here were getting stronger as well. Eventually, Azamir led the group to a much larger, fancier-looking door. "Well... This is it," he said. "Ultra Dark Lord Martcha is just through this door." When he tried to open it, however, something was wrong. He couldn't even GET to the door. "Oh... Oh no..."

"What? What's wrong?" Raya asked.

"It... Looks like Martcha put some sort of ghost barrier on the top of the tower," Azamir explained. "I... I can't get through. You're going to have to go ahead without me."

"Wait a minute, you're a ghost?" Samuel asked.

Azamir nodded. "Yes, and quite a powerful one at that," he replied. "If I were to open my eyes... I could defeat any of these monsters with no problem."

"Then why didn't you do that before?!" Yardi screeched.

"That... Isn't important right now!" Azamir exclaimed. "What's important is that you save Martcha! This barrier means I can't follow you up there... But I'll be with you in spirit! ...Quite literally."

"Azamir... Thank you," Susumu put his hand on his shoulder. "When this is all over, I promise I'll buy a lot of bananas from you."

"That's... All I could ask for, really," Azamir replied. "Now hurry, Susumu. Martcha is only growing more powerful with every second."

He waved to the group as they went up the stairs to prepare for the final battle. "For the sake of Miitopia... Susumu, you must succeed..."


	34. Act 5, Scene 5: Sky Scraper Showdown

This was it.

The group was in the inn, preparing to take on the Ultra Dark Lord and save Miitopia- And Martcha- once and for all. The entire group had paired off, and each pair was getting ready for the fight in their own way. Priff and Vinny were relaxing in their room, so they'd be well-rested for the battle ahead. Neal and Raya had just finished doing 100 sit-ups, and were preparing to do 100 more. And Susumu and Yardi...

Yardi was trying to get Susumu out of her bed again. "Oh no, we're not doing this again!" He scolded. "Why have you been acting so weird lately?! We have to go save Martcha!"

"Yardi..." After a moment, Susumu sat up in her bed. "As soon as we leave this inn, we'll be up against Martcha. Martcha is actually a god. She's much more powerful than any of us. What if something goes wrong? What if... What if she..."

"Seriously? THAT'S what you're worried about?" Yardi snapped. "Susumu, you're stronger than anything in this world now! If anyone can save Martcha, it's you!"

Susumu, however, still wasn't sure about this whole thing. Without saying another word, she curled back up under her blanket. Yardi looked like he was going to scream. He suddenly grabbed Susumu's wrist and pulled her out from under the covers. "Augh! Y-Yardi! What's-"

Yardi began to drag Susumu out the door of their room, not saying a word to her. "Samuel! Raya!" he called out. "We're going off to fight Martcha! I better see you out the door in five minutes!"

"Y-Yardi! Wait!" Susumu tried to get away. "I-I'm not ready for this yet! I'm nowhere near strong enough to fight her! I'm going to get killed!"

Yardi continued to drag Susumu through the door, however, even as Samuel and Raya were following them. "Will you quit your whining already?!" he snapped at her. "You're going to get up there and save Miitopia even if I have to drag you up there myself!"

The group finally made their way to the top, where Ultra Dark Lord Martcha was waiting for them. "So, you decided t-" She began, until she saw Yardi charging right at her. "GAAAH!" Well geez, that was painful to listen to. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"Skip the monologue, shrimpy!" Yardi got right in her face. "We're here to defeat you once and for all! So give us Martcha back right now!"

Martcha was startled by all this, but she tried to hide it. "I-I was getting to that!" she huffed. "Don't be so impatient! And, who do you think you're calling shrimpy?! You... You really think you can defeat me?!"

"Of course we do!" Yardi shouted. "That's why we're even here in the first place!"

"W-well then..." Martcha clearly wasn't prepared for this. "If you want her back so bad then... Come and get her!" She raised her staff into the air, and began to give off a strage purple glow. "Haaa..."

Susumu jumped as the tower suddenly started shaking. "W-what is she..."

"Susumu! Look out!" Samuel suddenly hit the deck. "She's drawing in huge amounts of energy! But... Where is she getting it all from?"

"...HAAAA!" Martcha was engulfed in a bright flash of light. When the light faded, however, she was nowhere to be seen. "...Kyahyahyahya! Well, would you take a look at me now!"

Martcha's body had completely changed. She had gone from looking like a tiny dog to... "She... Turned into the sun?!"

"She's giving off so much energy..."

"She's... So..." Raya suddenly burst out laughing.

"What? What's so funny?" Martcha looked around trying to find why he was laughing, before she suddenly realized. Even in this form she wasn't more than a foot tall. "Oh, come on!" she squeaked. "Even with all the power in Miitopia I can't catch a break?! ...Alright, that's it. Time to finish this."

Yardi was the first to strike, swinging his knife at Martcha right away. Raya fired a few cannon shots at her, trying to hold in his laughter. Susumu, however, curled up on the ground immediately. "This is where we die."

Yardi glared at her. "What do you think you're doing?! Get up here and save Martcha!"

"Yardi... I told you I couldn't do this," Susumu groaned. "There's no way we can win. She's stronger than all four of us combined."

Yardi turned back to her. "That isn't true! Susumu, you're stronger than you know! You aren't going to TRY to fight her?!"

As they were talking, however, Martcha spoke up. "Oh, I'm sorry, is this a bad time?" she said mockingly. "I didn't mean to interrupt your little lover's quarrel there. Oh, what? Are you gonna make something of it? Let's see just how loving you can be when I do this!"

"Ack!" With that, Yardi's face flew off. But Martcha wasn't done there. She produced a set of coins from her body and stuck Yardi's face to them. "Now let's see you contend with that!"

"Y-Yardi!" Susumu was shocked. "H-How is he going to fight like this?!" She quickly stood up. There was no more wasting time now. She had to save him!

"Susumu, wait!" Samuel called out. "We still have to defeat Martcha!"

Oh yeah. Samuel was right. Martcha was still going to be an issue, as much as she wanted to help Yardi... She turned back around and swung her microphone, hitting both Martcha and the Yardi Coins.

"Urgh!" Martcha was surprised by how strong Susumu had become. "T-that was... Almost impressive!" She shook it off. "But did you really think I would go down that easily?! I've still got one more trick!" Martcha suddenly began to glow, brighter, and brighter and brighter. Once the glow began to get blinding, Martcha let loose with a devastating explosion, severely injuring the entire party. "Kyahyahyahya! Didn't I tell you?! I'm unbeatable!"

"Uurgh..." Susumu tried to sit up. She felt like she was going to pass out. Yardi was on the ground shaking from the attack, and Raya wasn't even protected by his armor. "I... I knew it..." Susumu mumbled. "She's... She's going to kill us all..."

...But that was when Susumu felt something tap her on the shoulder. "Hey. Don't give up so easily, okay? Um..." Something started to smell really good. She opened her eyes to find that Vinny was holding his frying pan in front of her face.

"V-Vinny...?" Susumu looked at him. He... Wanted her to eat this? She hadn't noticed it before, but she was pretty hungry... And yet, as she was eating, she started to feel a lot better! Looking over, she could see Vinny and Konade taking a swing at Martcha before tending to the rest of the party.

"What's this?" Martcha taunted. "Getting your little friends to help you? Talk about a cliche!"

Neal stepped up, taking a swing at Martcha with his claws. "It may be cliche, but if it's gonna get you out of Martcha, I'm in!"

Then it was Priff's turn. "We all came here to help you," she said to Susumu.

"We are not to be leaving Miss Susumu behind!"

The party members all took turns, taking hits at Martcha in succession. "Urgh! S-Stop that!" Martcha scolded. "I told you I'm unbeatable!"

While this was going on, Susumu took the opportunity to finish off the Yardi Coins, and save Yardi's face. "Yardi!" she exclaimed. "Are you okay?"

It seemed like Yardi was furious, however. "GAH! Where is she?!" he demanded. "No one gets away with taking MY face like that!"

The rest of the group was busy attacking Martcha, but... She wasn't looking so good. In fact, a few more hits might be enough to take her down. "I... Told you all to stop that!" she yelled. "B-Before I..."

Before Martcha could finish her sentence, however, Yardi charged up to her and delivered the final hit. "GAAAAAH!"


	35. Act 5, Scene 6: Divine Benevolence

Suddenly, there was a blinding flash as Martcha began to disappear. All the energy she was giving off was dispelled, and as the light faded, all the faces that had been stolen were flying away, scattering all over Miitopia. And once the light was completely gone, Martcha was laying on the ground. "Urgh... I-is it finally over...?"

"Martcha!" Susumu ran over and quickly scooped her up. "Martcha, say something! Are you okay?!"

Martcha looked around. "Where... Are we...?" She looked back up at Susumu, smiling. "Don't worry. I'm okay now, and it's all thanks to you. Now, we've got to look... Look... Look out!" she suddenly screeched.

"Huh?!" Susumu turned around to see that the strange shadowy blob was hovering right over her head. Before it could attack her, however, Martcha fired a beam from her staff, trapping the shadow in a green bubble.

The shadow pounded against the sides of the bubble, but could not escape. "Hear me, creature of darkness!" Martcha declared, raising her staff. "I've used powerful holy magic to contain you. You will not be able to escape that bubble, even if you try." Her staff began to glow. "Now, I shall offer you a chance at redemption! Allow yourself to be purified, and live freely amongst the light!"

The shadow, however, seemed to be refusing Martcha's help. In fact, Martcha felt like her head was beginning to hurt. "Grr... I said... Allow yourself to be purified..."

The shadow refused once more, and Martcha screamed and dropped to the ground as the pain in her head got worse. "Martcha, stop!" Susumu picked her up. "That thing... It's going to kill you if you keep going like this!"

"I... Don't understand..." Martcha gasped. "I thought I could free this lost soul and bring it to the light... Why... Isn't this working?"

"...Because that thing never had a soul to begin with."

"Huh?" The group looked over, to see Azamir walking towards them with a sad expression. "Azamir?" Susumu asked. "How did you get up here?"

"When you saved Martcha... The barrier was lowered," he explained. "And this thing..." He looked up at the shadow. "...I was the one who created it."

The group looked confused, until Azamir began to explain. "Susumu. Do you remember what I said about my eyes?" Susumu nodded in response. "When I open my eyes..." He began, carefully opening his eyes in order to demonstrate. "These strange shadowy creatures come out. It's a curse I've lived with since the day I've died. Normally I keep it very well hidden, and normally these shadows are completely within my control. ...Except for this one. This one... Was too powerful even for me. It ended up overtaking me, and causing this whole mess..."

"You mean Azamir was infected with the T-Virus all along?!" Susumu exclaimed.

"Azamir..." Martcha groaned, before turning back to Susumu. "I apologize for everything he's caused. Azamir... Is something of a troublemaker, but he's normally completely harmless."

"It's alright," Azamir spoke up. "But... That shadow... You're not going to be able to convert it. Not a single speck of light remains inside it. Your only option is to seal it away, or..." Azamir looked away as he said this last part. "...You could destroy it, but... I... Would prefer if you didn't. As strange as it is, I am quite attached to my shadows..."

"You're attached to the thing that possessed you...?"

Martcha didn't particularly have the heart to destroy this thing anyway. She raised her staff and spoke to the shadow: "You who have refused my help... You who has shunned the light... I banish you to the farthest reaches of this world! You shall never harm another living being again! Now... BEGONE!" As Martcha spoke, a bright light surrounded her. The shadow was quickly engulfed by the light, and soon disappeared.

"...Where did she seal that thing away to?" Konade asked.

"Does it really matter?" Yardi responded.

Martcha then turned back to Susumu. "Now then, Susumu. Can you see it? All the faces that the shadow stole... They're going back to the people they belong to!" She pointed up into the sky, where all the stole faces could be seen flying back to their respective bodies.

"It's... Kind of magical, isn't it?" Susumu asked.

"You think THIS is magical?" Yardi groaned. "Now can we go yet? It's really hard to breathe up here."

Azamir gave Yardi an odd look, as though he didn't know what he was talking about, but Martcha nodded. "Of course, I'm very grateful to you all for saving me. Azamir will continue to make up for what he's caused, and as for me... Well, I think I'm going to Azamir's castle. Someone has to clean the place up after all! But what about you, Susumu? Where are you going after all this?"

Susumu's response was to scoop all of her friends into a group hug. "We're gonna be adventurers, of course!" She answered. "I wouldn't have made it so far if it wasn't for all of you. ...Thank you all so much!"

"Aw, Susumu!" Konade joined in the hug.

"Here's to all our future adventures!" Sachio declared.

The group sat there hugging for a few moments. Yardi, in the center of it all, was turning bright red again. "Okay, yeah yeah, adventures and all that!" he pulled away from the group, dashing down the stairs. "Love and friendship, now let's go eat!"

Susumu and Sachio looked at each other. "He's kind of a grump, isn't he?" Sachio asked.

"He is," Susumu responded. "But that's kind of charming, don't you think?" She then turned back to the rest of the group. "Come on, everyone! Let's go celebrate our victory!"

And so that's the story of Susumu, the Dark Lord, and the strange god known as Martcha. Miitopia returned to its previous peaceful state... ...But is this really the end? Is the adventure really over? What awaits the party next? Stay tuned for Act 6 of Damn It Azamir: The Movie!

END OF ACT 5


	36. Act 6, Scene 1: City Of Nightmares

The next days following the defeat of the Ultra Dark Lord were rather slow ones. The group had to fight the occasional monster here and there, save a few faces from time to time, but overall things were pretty quiet and peaceful. At least, until...

"Hey, everyone, we're back!" Susumu called out, as she stepped into the inn with Priff, Bowyetta, and Vinny.

"Oh! Weclome back, everyone!" A voice greeted from the other room. The group was surprised to see Junpei sitting at the kitchen table.

"Oh, hey, Junpei!" Susumu greeted him. "Uh... What are you doing in here? We defeated the Ultra Dark Lord a few days ago, and..."

"Oh! Yeah, about that," Junpei began. "Ever since I drove you guys around all those times, I've been thinking. You guys probably could still use my transport, and I could use some more adventure in my life, so... I wanted to know if... Maybe I could join your team? Kyahya?"

Susumu and Konade looked at each other for a moment. It'd be nice to have Junpei on board, but... Could he really handle this? "Well..." Konade began. "We think you'd make a nice addition to the team, so..."

Before she could finish, however, Priff stepped up. "Kukuku... So you'll be working with us too, eh? Welcome to the team, big brother~"

"Brother...?" Susumu was confused.

"Oh yeah. I, uh, never told you this before, but... Priff's actually my sister," Junpei explained. "That's, uh, why she's been so drawn to me and all."

"You two do look a lot alike," Vinny pointed out.

"Anyway..." Priff continued. "There's this place that was just recently discovered not far from here. They're calling it the Neon City. I was wanting to check it out, but... Well, I wanted to know what you guys thought."

Susumu's eyes lit up. "A city?! I'm in!" she proclaimed.

Konade nodded. "Exploring a new place... That sounds like it might be fun."

Vinny looked at the time. "Actually, I've got to start making dinner soon..." he said. "It's okay though. You guys can go ahead. I'll check it out next time."

Junpei nodded. "It's alright, I'll go too!" he declared. "I'd love to check the place out myself, kyahya!"

Susumu smiled. "Looks like it's settled then. Let's all head out! ...After we eat, I mean..."

The group was practically out the door the very minute they finished dinner. "Hey, come on!" Susumu called out. "I wanna check out this new place!"

Junpei was the first to dash out the door, and Priff slowly hovered out the door behind Susumu and Konade. Without much hesitation at all, the group hopped into the helicopter and took off. As much as Susumu was afraid of heights, she sat and looked out the window for the entire flight. "Do you see it yet?" she asked.

"No... No, I don't- Wait! Wait, I think I see something!"

Sure enough, the city began to appear in the distance, growing bigger and bigger as the group got closer. The helicopter touched down at the city's entrance, and Susumu and Junpei hopped out immediately. Konade stepped out a bit more carefully, and Priff stumbled out on her own.

Taking a look around, Susumu could see that the city seemed to be divided in half by one main road. In addition, the halves seemed to be divided into four sections each. "Huh. Two halves, four areas each..." She mumbled to herself.

As the group continued down the street, they came across a very familiar looking figure. It looked like Azamir, and... He seemed to be talking to someone else. A short girl with purple eyes and blue hair tied back into low pigtails. And... She was dressed just like Azamir?

"Alright! Today is day 6 of my training!" The girl declared. "I'm gonna work hard to make you proud, Azamir!"

Azamir looked up to see Susumu and her friends approaching. "Oh, Susumu!" he scolded. "I... Never expected to see you here."

"...Azamir?" Susumu asked. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, I live here now!" He said, now smiling. "It's the first step towards rebuilding my business. Besides, I... Have a certain fondness for this place. It reminds me of my home..."

"Uh... What is this place anyway?" Konade asked nervously.

"This place goes by many names," Azamir began. "City Of Nightmares, The Neon City... But most people call it New Lumos. This place... It's very dangerous. See how the city is divided like this? Each of those sections is guarded by a very powerful boss monster. The Ultra Dark Lord... They were too powerful for even her to control, so she released them here."

"Not me!" The blue-haired girl declared. "Azamir and I, we're not monsters!"

"Oh, yes!" Azamir said, looking at the girl. "Susumu, this is Reina. She lives her in New Lumos. Don't worry though. The monsters never seem to come to this main street for some reason. She's safe here."

Konade gave Reina a smile. "Hi there!" she said. "My name's Konade, and this is Susumu."

Priff stepped up. "Priff. My name's Priff," she said. She then pointed to her brother, who was skipping through the rain down the main street. "...And that's my brother Junpei."

"Reina has been working as my apprentice for the past few days," Azamir explained. "She wants to be a banana merchant like me one day, and I'm training her." He went silent for a moment, before tears started to fill his eyes.

Konade looked worried. "Um, Azamir? Are you okay?" she asked.

"I-I'm sorry, I'm just..." Azamir began. "Reina is so enthusiastic to learn from me... I have to make a good example for her and teach her well."

Reina then looked up at Azamir. "Hey, Azamir?" she asked "Should I tell Susumu about that thing?"

"Oh, that's right!" Azamir remembered. "Susumu, Reina knows of a place around here that may be of some interest to you. It's called the Tower Of Dread. It's been said that extremely powerful monsters sleep there... I feel that you and your friends may be the only ones who can defeat them."

Susumu made a face at the name. "Tower Of Dread...? That... Doesn't sound like anything I want to be a part of."

Priff spoke up again, however. "I'm in. Can you take us there, Reina?"

"W-well..." Reina started. "I... I would if I could, but... The thing is, all the monsters in the city have been going crazy lately. It's too dangerous for me to go alone."

Azamir sighed. "You'll have to get rid of those boss monsters before Reina can do anything. Nothing will attack us here in the main street, but even so... There's one boss monster in each of the eight districts. I... Recommend starting in the First District. The Eight District... There's some terrifying things in there. Not even I dare to step inside..." He started shivering at the thought.

"Eight districts, eight boss monsters," Susumu mumbled. "And if we defeat them all, then it'll be safe for Reina, won't it?"

"It seems simple enough..." Konade said. "But are we sure we're strong enough?"

"Of course we are," Priff stated. "Let's get Junpei and head into the First District."

Susumu nodded, and began to step into the First...

"Susumu, wait!" Azamir stopped her. "That's... The Fifth District."

"Oh. Right." Susumu turned around and led her group across the street. "Okay, now let's look for those boss monsters for real!"


	37. Act 6, Scene 2: A Vampire In New Lumos!

"Do you see anything yet?"

Susumu and Yardi had been wandering the second district of New Lumos for what felt like hours. They had heard that there was a particularly powerful monster nearby, and had decided to investigate. And yet, no matter where they searched, they couldn't seem to find anything.

Yardi looked back at Susumu. "Geh... Nothing's here," he huffed. "Let's just go home so we can get out of the-"

But that was when Yardi heard a noise behind him. "...Huh?" He turned around. Strange, was that a shadow moving in the-

"EEK!" Suddenly, the shadow jumped out at Susumu, knocking her to the ground.

"Susumu!" Thinking it was the same shadow from before, Yardi rushed to Susumu's side, preparing his knife. He stopped, however, when he noticed something odd about this shadow. It was... Oddly human-shaped. It was...

...Trying to bite her...?

"Urgh! Get away from her!" Yardi charged at the shadow, trying to push it off of Susumu. The figure suddenly looked up at Yardi. It... Was a person?! Whoever it was, he tried to push Yardi away, but Yardi wasn't giving up so easily. In the struggle, however, the person's teeth got driven further into Susumu's arm-

Susumu let out a yelp of pain that caused Yardi to let go of the strange person. The stranger then let go of Susumu and stood up, looking even more annoyed than usual. "You idiot," he hissed at Yardi. "I hope you're happy with what you've done. Both you AND your little girlfriend there will suffer for this."

Yardi was outraged, but before he could speak up, the stranger vanished. Whatever. Susumu was more important to him anyway. "...Susumu!" He quickly ran to Susumu's side and helped her up. Geez, her arm was hurt bad. He pulled a bandage out of his bag and wrapped it around her arm. "Are you alright?"

"Urgh... I-I feel... Really weird..."

Yardi sighed. "You're probably just shaken from what happened. Anyway, it's getting late. Let's just go home so we can get some rest."

The two returned to the inn, and the rest of the night was rather uneventful. Susumu slept pretty hard that night, and everything seemed fine, until...

When Susumu woke up the next morning, things felt odd. The sun seemed... A lot brighter than she remembered it being. She pulled the blanket off of her head, carefully poking her nose into the sunlight. "Augh!" That... Kind of hurt. She buried her face back into her blanket. What was going on here?

A few minutes later, Yardi got up. He was going to let Susumu sleep a bit more after what happened to her, but... He felt like he should at least see if she was okay. He went over to her bed and gave her a slight shake. "Susumu?"

"Ah! Y-Yardi!" Susumu exclaimed. "D-Don't... Look at me! I... I don't feel good at all today..."

"Susumu..." Yardi was starting to feel bad about yesterday. "Please, at least let me see your arm..." he pulled the blanket off of her and-

"Gah!" Susumu quickly covered herself with the blanket again. "Y-Yardi?! What's..." Well, there was no point in hiding it any longer. Still keeping her head covered, Susumu at least revealed her face to her friend. Her eyes were now an odd red color, and glowing slightly, and she seemed to have grown a pair of sharp fangs overnight.

"S-Susumu?!" Yardi jumped slightly at the sight of her. "W-what happened?! Are you... That guy- Was he-"

"I... Don't know," Susumu said starting to cry. "I just woke up like this. I-I don't even know why or how..." She curled up inside the blanket again. "Yardi... Would you mind closing the curtains? The sun hurts."

Yardi reached over to the window, and closed the curtains as Susumu had asked. He then went over to the window at the back of the room and did the same. Looking back at Susumu, he spoke up once more. "Hey, actually... I think there's a book downstairs that can help us. It's full of all kinds of information about magic and stuff. Maybe it'll tell us what that guy did to you!"

Susumu nodded. "Hey, yeah!" she said. "I think that book was somewhere in the front room, actually. ...Also, Yardi? Would you mind getting me a drink too? I... Don't want the others to see me like this."

Yardi nodded, and went downstairs to look for the book. "...Aha! Here it is!" Yardi took the book from the shelf and opened it up, flipping through the pages as he went to get Susumu something to drink. One of the pages in particular caught his eye. "...Vampires?"

Susumu was curled up in her blankets, beginning to fall asleep again, until Yardi suddenly burst into the room. "Susumu- Oh!" He suddenly looked embarrassed. "You... Probably want some rest now, don't you?"

"Honestly, I just want to be myself again," Susumu groaned. "Am I ever gonna have a normal life again?"

"It's alright, okay?" Yardi tried to assure her. "According to the book, you got bitten by a vampire. It says you'll be back to yourself at sunrise tomorrow. Er, just as long as you don't bite anyone yourself, that is. Here, I brought you something you can drink instead.

Susumu gulped as Yardi handed over a glass of tomato juice. Susumu HATED the taste of tomatoes, but... The thought of biting someone make her feel sick. She wouldn't mind avoiding THAT at this point. She started to drink from the glass, expecting to hate it, but... Oddly enough, it tasted extremely refreshing. Without thinking, she gulped down the entire glass. Hey, she was thirsty, after all. Yardi was... A bit surprised at how quickly she did this. "Er... Alright," he said. "I'll get you some more, okay?"

The rest of the day was surprisingly less trouble than Susumu expected. For the most part, she was just extremely tired. She spent most of the day sleeping, while Yardi stayed in the room keeping an eye on her, bringing more tomato juice every now and then. However, he DID try to avoid answering the others when they asked where Susumu was, simply saying that she had gotten sick from being in the rain. How else was he going to explain what happened?

This went on just fine, until later that night. Susumu sighed and curled up in her bed. Yardi said sunrise, right? Just a few more hours, and she would be herself again, wouldn't she? She closed her eyes and tried to get back to sleep. Except... Of course. The one time she actually WANTED to sleep today, she couldn't. As much as she hated to bother Yardi at this time, she had to tell someone how she felt. "...Yardi? Yardi! Are... You awake?"

"Mmph... Susumu...?" Yardi was half-asleep at this point, but as soon as he heard Susumu calling him, he got up. "Susumu? Is everything alright?"

Susumu sat up in her bed. "I... Can't get to sleep, Yardi," she admitted. "I tried, but..."

Yardi looked a bit sad. "O-Oh," he said, trying to think of something to do. "Well... Do you just want to talk about something?"

Just talk...? "...Actually, Yardi..." she began. "There is one thing I've been wanting to tell you for a while."

"Really? What is it?"  
"Well... We've known each other for a while now, haven't we?"  
"Yeah. We have."  
"And, well... After what happened in the Dark Lord's castle... I've been thinking about you a lot."  
Yardi's cheeks went pink then. "You... Have?"  
Susumu nodded. "You and I, and all the things we've been through... All the times we've protected each other, and that first day when you saved me... It all got me to thinking."  
"Thinking... What?"  
"Yardi... I..."  
"...Susumu?"  
"..."

Yardi got up out of bed, taking a look at Susumu. His face scrunched up when he saw what had happened. She fell asleep before she could say what she wanted! He sighed and went back to bed. Somehow, however, he was more relieved than anything. If it meant Susumu was okay, he could rest easily now.

The next night, the two returned to the second district of New Lumos, still searching for that powerful monster they heard of. "Stay close to me this time, Susumu," Yardi warned her. "In case that creepy guy comes back."

The person from before, however, happened to be listening to everything they were saying, carefully following them as they went. "Bleh... We're never gonna find this thing, are we?" Susumu asked. "We're almost at the inn and I haven't seen that boss anywhere!"

"...So you're looking for the monster that lives here?"

"Huh?" Yardi looked around, trying to find the source of the voice, until the person from before stepped out of the darkness. "! Y-You!" Yardi yelled. "What... What did you even DO to Susumu?!"

"Oh, shut up," the person snapped. "I know you wanted to play the hero but I couldn't care less. You're going to need me if you want to find the boss anyway." With that, he hovered towards the inn. "I'm going inside."

"Inside- Wait-" Yardi ran after the person, yelling at him the entire way. "Who said you could join us?! Who do you even think you are?!"

"...Toshiro."


	38. Act 6, Scene 3: One Hambaga Please

"Are you SURE this is gonna work?"

Yardi was standing in the middle of a back room of the inn, with Junpei standing at some sort of computer. Priff was there, too, but she was just watching. "Of course this is going to work," Junpei answered. "I've run all the calculations, and there's only a 10% chance of me dying!" He then walked away from the computer and stepped over to what appeared to be some sort of transporter. "Alright, Priff, hit the button and let's see if this works!"

Priff stepped over to the computer, and pressed a glowing yellow button on the keyboard. The transporter began to give off light, and began moving around Junpei. It kept moving faster, and faster... Until suddenly, there was a bright flash, and Junpei... Was gone!

"What in-?!" Yardi jumped back at the sudden flash, and was even more startled at Junpei's disappearance. "J-Junpei! Junpei- Where did you go?!"

Before long, a blurry image of Junpei started to flicker inside the transporter. After a moment the image cleared up. "Sorry about that, everyone," he said. "I, uh, guess I destroyed my own body."

"D-Destroyed your own..." Yardi was shocked at first, then became angry. "How the heck did you even manage that?!"

"I... Don't know," Junpei answered. "Maybe I should've had Priff press the blue button instead... Anyway, hey, at least I'm not dead, right? But, uh... It's gonna take a while for my body to reform. So... I won't be able to fly the helicopter for a while. Sorry."

"Then... How are we supposed to get around?" Yardi asked.

"Hey, Yardi," Priff said suddenly. "Why don't we all take a break? You know, relax, hang out in the inn a bit... I'm gonna go to the beach myself." With that, she walked out of the room.

"Uh, yeah, you have fun there," Yardi said. "I'm gonna stay here with Junpei. If only to keep him from feeling too isolated."

While Yardi kept an eye on Junpei, Priff, Samuel, and Susumu went to check out a beach not far from Greenhorne. "Well, folks, welcome to Galados Isle," Priff said, looking around. "Kukuku... It's everything I thought it would be~"

"It's so pretty here..." Susumu remarked, looking around. "I wonder if anyone lives here?"

As soon as she said that, however, a voice could be heard nearby. "Eeep!" A strange, short girl with green hair was rapidly approaching the group, but there was something different about her. She had pointed ears!

Whatever was going on, the girl seemed to be frightened by... Well, something. "Oh! Travelers!" The girl called out. "Please, I need your help!"

"That's a bit sudden," Priff stated.

Well, this girl seemed like she meant well anyway. It couldn't hurt to help her out, could it? "Er, hey, it's alright," Susumu said. "Just... Tell us what happened, okay? We'll help you out, but..."

The girl shook her head, and calmed down a moment before speaking again. "My name's Claire," she began. "And, I live here on Galados Isle. It's normally a pretty calm place, but... Well, lately things have been kind of a mess. Monsters have been popping up left and right... You may not believe this, but I was just attacked by a hamburger!"

Samuel blinked. "A... Hamburger?"

"Maybe we should've brought Vinny~" Priff remarked.

Okay, now that got Susumu interested. A hamburger attacking someone? "Now I'm curious," Susumu said. "Take us to this hamburger, Claire!"

As Claire led the group to their destination, she continued talking. "You know, I can't thank you enough for your help!" she said. "Galados Isle is my home, so I like to make sure it stays calm and peaceful around here. But... Do you guys come around here often? I've never seen you around before."

"Actually, we're new to this place," Samuel answered. "We would've had someone bring us here, but..."

"Our driver is sort of out of commission," Priff finished.

"Out of commission?" Claire asked. "What happened to him?"

Before anyone could answer, however, Samuel screamed. Looking in the direction he was pointing, Susumu could see... What looked like a giant hamburger?! From the looks of things, the hamburger wasn't alone either. There was some sort of red whispy thing with it now-

"Susumu, get back!" Claire suddenly called out. "That thing is going to-"

Before Susumu could respond, however, the hamburger ended up biting at her. Susumu tried to step back, but... It ended up biting her right on her arm, the one that was still injured. Susumu yelped, falling back slightly and holding onto her arm, but... The hamburger had different ideas. While Susumu was distracted, the hamburger tossed her into the air and caught her in its mouth.

Samuel was horrified. "O-oh no! Not... Not again!" He rushed over to help Susumu, but... As he did, he let out a scream. He saw the red whispy thing slash at him, but he couldn't feel anything. At least, not physically. Everything was starting to get dark, and he suddenly felt very cold...

Susumu, meanwhile, was trying to escape from the hamburger's mouth, before it decided to actually eat her. "S-Samuel?!" she called out. "Samuel, what's going on?!"

Claire then leaped forward, ready to save them both. "Susumu, just hold on!" she declared. "Samuel just got attacked by a Reaper, but don't worry! I'll resuce both of you!"

No sooner had she said that, however, than the Reaper slashed at her as well.

Priff shrugged, stepping up towards the hamburger. "Kukuku... Looks like it's up to me~" She then turned toward the Reaper, hoping to talk things out like always. "Hey. Uh, sorry to interrupt, but... We don't want any trouble. We just want to keep our friend from getting eaten. So... Could you give my friends their souls back and let her go? We're really not asking for a fight here."

The Reaper, however, didn't seem to take too kindly to Priff's words, and slashed at her, too.

This was it. Susumu was going to be eaten, and her friends had all had their souls taken. Was this how it was going to end?

...No.  
No, it wasn't.  
Susumu may not have been the quickest thinker, but she had to do something to help. She had to get herself out of here somehow, didn't she? All she could do was grab onto the hamburger's "tongue" and pull as hard as she could from this position.

The hamburger twisted its "face" around, trying to shake Susumu off, but she still held on. It started to get difficult, but eventually the hamburger spat her out. "Urk!" She landed on the dirt next to her friends. "O-oh no... I can't fight these things by myself... But I can't just leave everyone behind... What do I do?"

For some reason, Susumu felt like singing. She couldn't place why, and she wasn't sure if it would even help but... She felt like she HAD to sing. And so she did. After a minute, Samuel started to open his eyes. Her song had reached his soul! "Ahh... Su... Sumu...?"

The first thing Susumu did was swing her microphone at the monsters, hitting them both before the Reaper could take either of their souls. "Samuel, revive the others!" she instructed. "I'll hold them off!"

As Susumu fought the Reaper first, Samuel turned to the other girls and raised his staff. "I hope this works..." he mumbled.

Sure enough, Claire and Priff started to sit up again as well. "Urgh... W-what's..." Claire was stunned when she first woke up, but Priff on the other hand...

Priff charged directly at the Reaper, he eyes glowing oddly the whole time. "Kukukuku~" It wasn't long before she and Susumu tok down the Reaper themselves. "These things are so fragile~"

"We took care of one of them," Susumu said. "Now let's hurry and- AUGH!"

Once again, the hamburger scooped Susumu up into its mouth. It was clear that it wasn't going to let her go so easily. "Oh no, not again!" Samuel squeaked, raising his staff into the air. A bright light started to fill the area, surrounding Samuel and the hamburger. A flash came from Samuel's staff, and a beam of light struck the hamburger. The hamburger was stunned, allowing Susumu to escape!

Claire then jumped up into the air. "Oh! May I?" she asked, twirling around. She pointed her bow to the air and fired it, taking down the hamburger with a rain of magic arrows.

Susumu landed face-down on the dirt, as Samuel rushed to help her up. "A-Are you okay?"

Susumu was perfectly unharmed, but Claire... Claire's eyes were sparkling like never before. "T-that... That was amazing, Samuel!" she proclaimed. "I had no idea you could do that!"

Samuel shook his head. "I've... Never really had to use it much before," he said. "Garaden gives me the power to punish monsters, but... I'd rather not kill them if I had to."

Claire was over the top with happiness. "Oh, travelers, I can't thank you enough!" she exclaimed. "And, if you don't mind... I have a request. Seeing the way you battled... Fighting alongside you... It filled me with an energy I've never felt before! You go on adventures around Miitopia, don't you? May I join you?"

Susumu was a bit surprised by this. Someone she just met... Wanted to join her team? She did like Claire a lot, and wanted to get to know her more... Her confused expression changed to a wide smile. "Claire, we'd be happy to have you along!"

Priff, meanwhile, was scooping up what was left of the hamburger with her fork. "Hey, let's not waste food here," she said. "We're gonna have enough for lunch and dinner today, kukuku~"

The rest of the group looked at each other in silence, before helping Priff pick up the hamburger's leftovers. Well, at least Susumu had a new friend- And quite a story to tell the others when they got back. "Hey, I wonder if Junpei's body's reformed yet?"


	39. Act 6, Scene 4: Where Things Get Weird

The fight continued without much incident, and the group managed to deal a decent amount of damage. At that moment, however, Jeremy decided to try something. he stared directly into Susumu's eyes, he started to emit a strange golden glow.

"Eep!" Susumu had no idea what this meant, but she knew that she did NOT like being stared at. She closed her eyes, but not before they flashed the same golden color. When she finally did open her eyes, however, something was... Off about her. It was hard to tell, but her eyes were more golden than their usual yellow color, and her eyelashes seemed thicker than normal. When she spoke, her voice was oddly stiff and monotone: "I... Am... Pharaoh..."

"Susumu? What are you-" Neal thought this behavior alone was very strange, but... Susumu knelt down and put her ketchup bottle on the ground. Was she... Refusing to fight?! "Hey! Susumu! You gotta get up! We have to-"

But as Neal was trying to get Susumu back to normal, something ended up hitting him in the back. REALLY hard. "Urgh!" The hit knocked him forward, almost into Susumu.

Samuel quickly ran over to Neal's side. "A-Are you okay?" he asked, raising his staff to heal him. Before he had a chance, however, Jeremy attacked again, knocking Samuel's staff out of his hand.

Priff picked up Samuel's staff and gave it back to him, before scooping up Susumu and her ketchup bottle. Susumu didn't react to this at all. How was Jeremy so strong all of a sudden? "We can't handle him right now," Priff said. "We're going to have to run for now."

"Run?" Samuel asked. "But... Susumu is..."

Before he could finish, however, Neal suddenly jumped in front of Samuel, protecting him from another attack from Jeremy. "Priff's right!" he exclaimed. "We've gotta get her out of here!"

Neal and Samuel ran as fast as they could out of the pyramid, and even Priff moved faster than usual. Once they were outside, they sat Susumu down in the sand, taking a closer look at her. Her eyes were still oddly colored, and she still had that same blank stare. "Hey, Susumu!" Neal yelled at her. "Can you hear me? Snap out of it!"

Susumu simply turned and stared at Neal. "I... Am... Pharaoh..."

Priff closed her eyes for a second. "Ku. No wonder she's so out of it," she said. "She's cursed. her mind's completely empty. Well, mostly. She can't act on her own, that's for sure."

"What are we gonna do?" Samuel asked. "We've got to save her, but... Jeremy is way too strong for us."

"We've got no choice," Neal sighed. "We have to go back to the inn and regroup."

The group quickly headed back to the inn, carrying the unwitting Susumu along with them. Once they were inside, they placed Susumu into a bed. She still wasn't responding to anything at all. "What are we gonna tell Yardi?" Samuel asked.

"She's still pretty out of it," Neal sighed. "Susumu? Can you hear me? You've gotta wake up!"

Susumu blinked at him again, and finally, was able to say something else. "Yardi..."

"Y-Yardi..." Susumu was laying in her bed, with Yardi hovering over her, wiping her face with a cold towel.

"She's... Not looking so good," Yardi sighed, turning to Konade. "Her temperature is through the roof. I wonder if she didn't catch something in New Lumos."

Konade shook her head. "I'm going to make her some tea or something," she said. "She's probably going to have to stay in bed for a few more days." With that, she left the room and went downstairs.

Yardi looked back at Susumu. She was tossing around a lot and mumbling about something. What was she dreaming about?

"What do you mean I can't see her?"  
"Yardi, Susumu isn't feeling well right now. We think she's really contagious too, so it's better if we try to limit our-"  
"If she's sick it's my job to get her healthy again! She does it for me all the time!"

Yardi stepped past Konade and into the room, carrying some sort of strange bottle with him. "Susumu! Are you-" Oh. Her eyes. What was going on with them? He put the bottle on the dresser to get a closer look at her.

Susumu had been eyeing the bottle the entire time. As soon as Yardi set it on the dresser, she grabbed it, and started drinking from it. "S-Susumu!" Yardi quickly grabbed the bottle away from her. "T-That bottle... It was full of poison! I was trying to think of how to get rid of it safely, but... Why would you...?"

Susumu blinked at Yardi again, her face starting to get more pale than usual. "Yardi..." Was all she said.

Wait a minute. The way Susumu was talking... Her oddly stiff behavior... And that look in her eyes... Yardi realized exactly what was going on. "! ...Jeremy...!"

Yardi quickly scooped up Susumu and prepared to carry her out the door, ready to take Jeremy on himself, until he was stopped by Samuel. "Yardi, wait! I still have to get the poison out of her body!" He raised his staff for a moment, before realizing something. "Um... Would... Everyone mind giving us a moment? Trust me, it's for the best."

Once Samuel had taken care of Susumu, the next step was getting her out of the inn: A very difficult task, considering that she ignored almost everyone. The only person she would show any sort of response to was Yardi.

"Susumu?" Konade spoke to her softly, hoping her words would get through. "We need to save Neksdor Town, remember? So, if you can hear me, please, come with us."

Susumu blinked yet again. "Yardi..."

Then it was Sachio's turn. "Hey, remember me? It's your twin, Sachio! Let's go kick Jeremy's butt!"

"...Yardi..."

Yardi had had enough. He wanted the real Susumu back, and he was willing to fight Jeremy to save her. Just as before, he picked her up and charged towards the stairs. "Sachio! Bowyetta!" he called. "We're gonna need you guys! I'm taking her to the pyramid!"

The group reached the pyramid to find that, oddly enough, Jeremy had been there waiting for them. On one hand, he was already slightly weakened from their first encounter. On the other, he didn't seem happy that the group had taken Susumu with them, and tried to attack them right away.

"Gah!" Yardi quickly dodged Jeremy's attack, and placed Susumu on the ground. "Hey you! Give me my girlfriend back!" He jumped at Jeremy to attack, but...

Susumu suddenly jumped up, standing between Jeremy and Yardi, almost as if she was trying to shield Jeremy. Yardi suddenly stopped himself before hitting Susumu. "Susumu! What are you doing? He's..."

"It is not seeming like Miss Susumu is going to be letting us attacking of Jeremy," Bowyetta pointed out. "We must be doing something about her first!"

Sachio had an idea. "Leave it to me!" He said, and then took place in front of Susumu. "Hey, Susumu! Take a look at this!" He began moving his wand in a spiral motion, creating a blue pattern in front of Susumu's face.

Susumu found it harder and hard to keep her eyes open. After a moment, she curled up on the ground and quickly fell asleep. Jeremy was not pleased by this at all. It looked like he'd just have to get himself ANOTHER servant, and he knew exactly who to use. He began to give off that strange golden glow again, this time staring at Sachio.

Bowyetta, however, quickly stepped in, covering Sachio's face with her fan. "Please to not be looking, Mr. Sachio!"

While this was going on, Yardi managed to sneak up behind Jeremy, and hit him with a surprise attack. "Ha!" he yelled. "What, this is the big bad Jeremy? He's a joke!"

"Then again, the others DID kind of damage him a lot before we got here," Sachio commented.

Yardi didn't care, he just wanted to save Susumu. He kept slashing at Jeremy as much as he could. It seemed like he didn't need the others' help at this point...

While Yardi was finishing off Jeremy, Sachio and Bowyetta decided to take care of Susumu. "Hey! Susumu, can you hear me? Yardi's gonna get you out of this, so... Wake up! Susumu!"

"...Susumu!"

When Susumu opened her eyes, she was back home in her bed. And she felt... Awful, to say the least. It felt like her entire body was on fire. "Urgh... Yardi...?" she groaned. "What... Happened to Jeremy?"

"Who?" Yardi asked, before shaking his head. "Ah, doesn't matter. How are you feeling?"

"Terrible," Susumu answered. So it seemed like she had dreamed the whole thing, but... Did she catch a cold or something in New Lumos? "Yardi... Have you been taking care of me this whole time?"

Yardi's face turned pink at her question. "Y-Yeah, I have," he said. "Uh... Here, Konade made you this." He reached over to the dresser and picked up a cup of Susumu's favorite tea. "You probably want something to drink after all that."

"Thank you." Susumu took the cup and drank from it. It took a moment before she came up to speak again. "And Yardi? ...Thanks for taking care of me. I... Don't think I'm gonna be able to fight again for a while."

"It's... No trouble at all, Susumu," Yardi answered, still trying to hide his face. "You probably want to go back to sleep now, so... I'll let you be, okay?"

Yardi left the room somewhat quickly. Was his face starting to feel hot too?


	40. Act 6, Scene 5: The Shout In The Dark

So this was it.

Eight districts, eight bosses. It had been a long and difficult journey, but now it was finally at its end. Susumu made her way down the main street of New Lumos, where Azamir and Reina were waiting at the end.

"We're here, Azamir," Susumu said. "You said Reina had something she wanted to say?"

Reina was standing behind Azamir, looking very forlorn. She stepped out, and looked around. "Go on then, Reina," Azamir said. "What did you need to tell us?"

Reina turned to face Azamir. "Azamir... I... Want to thank you," she began. "And, Susumu... Thank you too. If it wasn't for the both of you, and Martcha... I wouldn't have become what I am today."

Susumu seemed confused. "Reina, what do you...?"

Reina turned around to continue. "Well... How shall I say this? When Martcha tried to purify that shadow... It actually worked. Well, sort of. A small speck of light began to form inside the shadow. It ignored it, thinking the light would fade out soon. But it didn't. The light only grew, until eventually... The light completely overtook the shadow, and... I was free."

"Free...?" Azamir asked. "Reina... Does that mean you...?"

Reina nodded. "Once I was free from the darkness, I... Started to change. Into... Well, the form you see now. But something was wrong. As soon as I was free, I felt no emotion. At all. I left Neksdor, thinking there was something wrong with me. Thinking I would never be a normal person, until... I ran into someone in the desert who needed help. I didn't know what I could do, but I helped them get to the town, to find someone who did. And that's when it happened. When I started to feel something. It was small at first, but... The more people I helped, the more I started to feel, until... Until I became REAL. That was when I knew what to do. To make up for what I did... I went to find Azamir. I wanted to help him rebuild his life, and maybe build one of my own."

It took Azamir a minute to realize what Reina was saying, but when he did his eyes opened for a split second. "Reina... That shadow... Was you? And you came back here because you wanted to help me?" He was having a hard time believing what he was hearing. This little girl who looked up to him so much...

She looked back up at him, with tears starting to fill her eyes. "I know, I don't expect you to forgive me, especially after I possessed both you and Martcha," she said. "But... I just... Want to thank you. For... Not just destroying me when you had the chance. For giving me another chance to make things right again."

"Reina..." Azamir wasn't sure how to react to this. He'd never heard of anything like this before. A spirit becoming a person was strange enough, but she actually wanted to make up for everything? Without another word, he picked her up and gave her a hug. "Reina. It's true that you did a lot of bad things before, but... You truly did want to change, didn't you? Look at you now. You've changed so much since then, and... I'm so glad you did."

"Azamir... Thank you," Reina said. "I'm going to start doing a lot better from now on, I promise. I... I'm gonna make you proud!"

"...Hey, yeah!" Sachio suddenly remembered something. "Azamir, didn't you say Reina had something to show us?"

"Oh yes, that's right!" Azamir put Reina back down. "Reina, why don't you show them what you can do now?"

Reina nodded, then turned to Susumu. "Susumu, remember how I said I had a place I could show you?" she asked. "Well... You've cleared out all the boss monsters in New Lumos, right? Well, now that we're all here, it's time to show you what I can really do!"

Reina closed her eyes, and held her arms out in front of her. "Ancient tower, I call upon you. Rise from the darkness, and show these travelers the way!" She then opened her eyes, and raised her arms above her head. When she opened her eyes, however, they seemed to be completely black, save for a thin purple iris glowing between the dark patches. There was a loud rumbling nearby, and a tower began to rise from the ground, right before the group's eyes.

Once the tower had finished rising, Reina's eyes returned to normal. "This is the Tower of Dread," she explained. "In that tower... You will find the most fearsome and powerful monsters in all of New Lumos. I wish you all the best of luck."

Azamir then turned back to Reina. "Now then, Reina..." he began. "You're going to be a wondeful banana merchant someday. But only if we get back to your training."

"Right!" Reina declared. "It's only Day 17 of my training, after all! See you all later!" And with that, the two disappeared into the city.

"The Tower of Dread..." Susumu mumbled. Boy, this place sure did live up to its name. "Dread" was the only way Susumu could describe how she was feeling, and she hadn't even stepped inside yet.

Raya's tail was wagging furiously. "There's gotta be something cool at the top!" he declared. "Come on, let's go in!"

"Well, let's get going then." Raya rolled through the doorway of the tower, followed by his fellow dog Vinny. Susumu and Konade, however, hung back, as Susumu stared at the tower, shaking slightly. "Susumu, it's going to be okay," Konade tried to comfort her. "We've fought a lot tougher, haven't we? If we can beat the Ultra Dark Lord... We can beat anything we'll find in here."

Susumu sighed. "You know... You're right, Konade," she replied with a smile. "We shouldn't have any trouble in here, right? Anyway, we should go help Raya and Vinny before they get mowed down."

Once the girls stepped inside the tower, they saw that Raya and Vinny were already fighting some sort of minotaur. "Hey, that looks like the minotaur we fought in the first district," Susumu pointed out.

"And it's a lot stronger too!" Raya stated, firing a cannon shot at the minotaur. "You girls keep an eye out!"

And then Susumu got an idea. She remembered that Junpei had given her something to try out once she went back to New Lumos. Reaching into her back, she produced a small bottle of purple flakes. "Hey, guys!" she called to the others. "Let's all try some of this! Junpei gave these to me before we left. He called them 'hype sprinkles'. I wonder what they do."

The party took a few flakes into their hands, and sprinkled some into their mouths. It took a minute for anything to happen, but... Susumu slowly felt herself getting more energy. "I-Is anyone else starting to feel-"

"HOOO-WAH!" Raya suddenly charged at the minotaur, swinging his cannon with full force. "COME ON, EVERYONE! LET'S TAKE THIS THING DOWN!"

Susumu swung her microphone wildly, Konade was flinging petals everywhere, and Vinny slammed the minotaur with his frying pan several times. The minotaur wasn't done with them, however. It raised its hammer and smashed it into Susumu.

...But she didn't feel any pain! It was weird, very weird, but the strike didn't hurt her at all! She was able to continue swinging, and eventually, the party took the minotaur down.

"We... Did it!" Susumu gasped. Her hype sprinkles were starting to wear off, and her entire body was beginning to feel sore. "Now the next floor is..."

The group slumped onto the ground, and Susumu pulled the bottle of hype sprinkles out of her bag again. They ate a bit more, and continued up to the next floor.

The next few floors were a breeze for the group, thanks to the hype sprinkles. They fought a computer head who could summon robots, a couple of frogs like they fought in the Realm Of The Fey, and even a dragon on the fourth floor! But as time went on, hype sprinkles began to run out, and the group's injuries were beginning to catch up with them.

On the fifth floor, however, things were beginning to turn around. The group trudged up the stairs, bruised, bleeding in some places, and feeling VERY exhausted. The boss of this floor was a Cerberus as well. What Susumu didn't know was that this would be difficult.

Susumu reached back into her bag for another dash of hype sprinkles, but something was wrong. "T-the jar..." She groaned. "It's..." The group had ended up using all their hype sprinkles, and had completely emptied the jar already. How were they going to win now?

They weren't.

Before the group could even do anything, the Cerberus snapped at Susumu, flung a fireball at Konade, and tried to freeze the entire group with ice breath. This thing was fast, and it had every intention of wiping them out.

"W-what do we do now...?" Raya asked. "We're... Gonna die like this..."

"No... No, we're not..." Konade picked up Vinny, took Susumu's hand, and carried them towards the stairs. "Come on. We're getting out..."

Fortunately for Raya, his armor allowed him to roll away with ease. They managed to escape back to the fourth floor, and the cerberus was unable to fit through the door follow them. With the cerberus barking at snapping at the stairwell, the group collapsed in the center of the floor to rest. "We... Made it..."

They weren't completely home yet, but once they were strong enough to walk again they could go back to the inn. Maybe they would return to the Tower of Dread another day.

But not for now...


End file.
